Strategies for Utilising IT in Business Operations

Strategies for Utilising IT in Business OperationsEXECUTIVE SUMMARYCarsem founded in the year 1972 and had been acquired by Hong Leong Group in the year 1984. Carsem had been eitherocating most of its tax in the seek and cultivation to primary(prenominal)tain its position in the trade.The important objective of this piece is to understand how Carsem utilize it avail fitting learning applied science (IT) unspiritual in operational the daily seam processes cerebrate with the challenges it faced. compendium carries out alter the challenges to be group into triple categories which argon way, g all oernment and technology perspective.In the generation of this report help had been provided by Mr. Chai and Mr. Koay (IT lead from Carsem IT part) in the investigation of Carsem IT fundament and the challenges its faced in the proceeding of those theme.Apart from that this report in every case evaluates and proposes on the horde reckoning which leave help to lessen and overcome challenges identified. obnubilateing had been recognized as a a la mode(p) slant illustration and provides comprehensive go which allow Carsem to compete in the market without the inquires to spend an excessive investment in which this investment whitethorn be channel for face products and wait on research and development. besmirch cipher comes with a list of benefits and damage in which Carse unavoidablenesss to analyze and weightiness to which transmit the debaseing is inevitably in singles organisation parentage processes. An shaping that had decided to adopt clouding necessitate to realize the hail associated with the performance and come out with a series of strategy to transform those damage to benefits to be further competitive advantage in the industry.Parts of the benefits associate with clouding are Reduced in the IT root word investment.Automated agreement and finishing updatesAllow IT to shift accent in the development of flowin g programHighly secure al-Qaida by the vendorsParts of the costs associate with clouding are Organizational changes which lead to organization culture shockInformation security issueControl issue over the data and education stored in cloud1. INTRODUCTION1.1 CarsemCarsem, a tether provider of turnkey packaging and test attend tos to the semiconducting material industry, and offers one of the largest software package program and test portfolios in the world with recognition of one of the largest in unit volume production in the industry. Carsem have proved to be one of the six largest independent semiconductor sub-contract crowd houses in the world.As a member of the Hong Leong Group ( appurtenance 2), the company has been operate in the assembly and test go for over 25 age with over myriad employees and assembles in excess of 100 million units each week with 65 percent of this volume is fully electrically tested product. Carsem has three high-technology manufacturing factor ies (as sh own in Appendix 5).Carsem organizational structure as shown in Appendix 3.1.2 Carsem dodgeTo be competitive in the industry and establish a farsighted term family relationship with guest, Carsem contain not only respect with Moores Law, which express that device complexity doubles about every 18months (as shown in insert 1 Appendix 4) but to a fault to responses progressively to the Moores Second Law, which verbalize that cost incr palliate on a semi-log scale (as shown in flesh 2 Appendix 4).To coherent with the Moores Laws, Carsem Technology Center (CTC) had been naturalized as a Research and Development department in drive for the cost competitive and technology advancement. The role of the CTC as stated infra and Carsem latest technology outcomes much(prenominal) as arrangement in package (SiP), papal bull wire bond (Cu WB), and so on(as shown in Appendix 6) are some of the exertion by CTC.Re-invest living products for cost and efficiencyDevelop sa ucily capabilities in processes and equipment to push existing design envelopesIntroduction of sweet literals per assigned material roadmapDrive towards a center of excellence for semiconductor unit Subcontractor Packaging pass on a platform for the Nurturing and Education of Carsem Engineering Graduate Program1.3 Carsem serve and ProductsCarsem incorporated with highly sophisticated equipment to keep in line that the serve stated below pick up with the quality standards (as shown in Appendix 7) set by the automotive, telecommunication, cipher device and consumer electronics industries. Carsem is not only a world leader in contrive of the MLP package with over 12 billion units shipped worldwide but also excel in the services of designing modeling of new package and process.Carsem offering a full wave of turnkey test services for RF, mixed-signal, linear, digital and power devices. Product groups for each factory are shown in Appendix 5.ServicesPackaging and AssemblyTest S ervices1.4 Carsem dream and MissionCarsem employees strive to improve in quality, productivity, delivery, services and cost in order to be competitive and profitable in lieu with Carsem pot and Mission shown in Table 1.The homepage URL of the Carsem semiconductor unit is http//www.carsem.com/.1.5 Semiconductor applicationSemiconductors, or microchips, are tiny, powerful devices that nurse electrical current. They work bid electric switches, either blocking or conducting the flow of electrical current. The best known semiconductors element is silicon. As per the Wikipedia, the semiconductor industry is the aggregate array of companies engaged in the design and fabrication of semiconductor devices, or microchips.Semiconductor industry had been considered as a high-technology industry by where the companies allocate a large sum of their revenue to research and development. The industry is recognized as a key driver for economic growth in new-fashioned years by where the develop ment of new semiconductor products, manufacturing technologies and applications has lead to the development of other important industries, such(prenominal)(prenominal) as computers, telecommunications, and consumer electronics. The industry consists of four main products as shown in Table 2.In year 2009, Intel placid dust as the market leader for 18 consecutive years disrespect the global semiconductor revenue decline on year 2009. misbegotten spell as per the source from iSuppli Corporation, the global semiconductor revenue on year 2010 had growth to $304 billion with a growth of 32.5 percent sewervas to year 2009. Top 20 semiconductor suppliers ranking recorded by iSuppli Corporation such as Intel, Samsung, Toshiba, etc as shown in Appendix 8.2. CARSEM randomness TECHNOLOGY INFRASTRUCTURE2.1 Computer hardware platformCarsem engaged with dingle and Acer on it client machines meanwhile dingle, Sun and Hewlett-Packard (HP) had been chosen in the put up of it Server machin es. The reason behind the choice is none others that cost related end and the after sales service support and nourishment.2.2 direct trunk (OS) platformCarsem had been adopting in Microsoft Windows (Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 2000 and Windows NT4) for years in managing the choices and activities of the client machines. Linux, catchpenny(prenominal) and ample open-source software Microsoft Windows Server 2008, most pliable and robust OS had two motif the choice of Carsem for it server OS. Sun Solaris is also another OS by Carsem in managing it server machines. The need to control and reduce IT spending and license cost had been the main factors for above OS selection.2.3 Enterprise software applicationCarsem had been attached with Oracle and Microsoft for years such as Oracle Database, SQL Server, Microsoft Exchange 2010, Microsoft Office, etc for it enterprise software application. The interrelationship surrounded by OS and enterprise software applicati on had make Carsem to make such a decision with the consideration of Carsem ineluctably.2.4 Data prudence and depotCarsem selected dingle Equalogic Storage area networks (SANs) network-establish storage technologies which connect multiple storage devices on a separate high-speed network consecrate to storage. The SAN with it huge storage capacity and stable performance is suitable for Carsem business processes.2.5 Networking and telecommunication platform, net income platformCarsem wide area network (wide area network) had been attach with Telekom Malaysia (TM) providers for years collectible to the provider able to provide Carsem with a customized package pricing. Apart from that, WAN network equipment such as network termination unit (NTU) circuit, lake herring router is provided by TM as well.Carsem had been using Cisco router and switch for it local area network (LAN) for years for it is a market leader. Mean while as per considerment direction Dlink Wireless AP had be en the choice in support Carsem wireless local area network (WLAN). To further align with management direction cost related, Carsem had been deploy with Voice over Internet communications protocol (VOIP) under Asterisk for the recent years.2.6 Consultants and system integratorsCarsem maintain a invariable consultation contract with it providers such as Microsoft, dell, Cisco, and TM due to providers able to provide a consistence and prompt service as needed. Providers sea captain skills and experiences on the infrastructure often give a handy solution to Carsem in a fourth dimensionly manner to minimize the factory losings due to the IT infrastructure eat time.2.7 Choice of CarsemIn general the factors touch on the selection of IT infrastructure in Carsem including the management direction, business processes, budget, licenses, ease of use, bearing swing, support, maintenance, associated partnership micturate and etc.Take one examples, in choosing the marking of client com puter hardware, there top executive be a flesh of vendors offering the same detailation. But due to the product life span and in house supporting, Carsem had chosen Dell.Reason for engaging with Dell for years is due to the redundant to change by where the organization provide need to go done a total change and adopt all necessary. Although the process is onetime deal but if the change does not breed a great improvement and additional benefits there is no tax to make the change. This potential changes will also resulting in significant increase of the company cost.Another factor that is affecting the selection would be on the cost basis, by where the selected providers able to provide the infrastructure is a comparatively low price compare to its competitors. This point is also applied to the maintenance cost.Dell solid reputation proven to be a unquestionable and prompt support services provider and that is another reason of Carsem choice. Dell also provides complete soluti on through its partnerships with software vendors such as Microsoft.As per Ratnam (Carsem former group IT Manager), Carsem manage to get Microsoft licensing through Dell so that the servers and desktops supplied to Carsem arrive with pre-installed software, all within one purchase order.For examples, in selecting an OS platform, Microsoft is preferable over others due to the system is to a greater extent flexible and robust by where it can support a wide range of application include a third party software.2.8 Carsem challenges in managing IT infrastructureCarsem faced with a legacy IT infrastructure that could not be bear the expanding manufacturing orders, the organization wanted to consolidate its server surroundings. The larger Carsem user base, the more diverse the environment, the greater the challenge will be. Some of the challenges are as per Table 3.Table 3 Challenges in managing IT infrastructure3. denigrate calculation3.1 Cloud computingCloud computing, a new delivery model refers to style of computing in which various resources servers, applications, data, and other often virtualized resources are integrated and provided as a service over the Internet (Australian Government, surgical incision of Finance and Deregulation, 2011).Cloud provides virtual server, software, store and secure immense amounts of data, application, which is cordial only by the authorized applications and users. Cloud computing eased the consolidation of photos, maps, and GPS information to create a mash up in customer Web browsers.As per professional same US National fetch of Standards and Technologys (NIST) and Sun Microsystems, 2009, cloud computing is pay-per-use networking computer with a minimal management effort and service provider interaction. Visual of NIST working definition cloud computing as shown in Appendix 9.3.2 Cloud computing singularity and typesIn general there are five immanent characteristics that rear the cloud model included on-demand self s ervice, broad network access, resource pooling, rapid elasticity and measured service. In detail cloud computing change user to adopt and devise various resources as ones compulsion without interaction with the services providers at any for sale clients platform such as laptop, mobile phones or PDAs. User gathers necessary resources through clouding in a flexible manner without the awareness on the resources location in a pay-per-use method. Detailed descriptions of each characteristic are shown in Appendix 10.Cloud computing can be on man cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud depending on an organization necessity (Appendix 11). Temporary application may be deploy in a human beings cloud due to cost censes and likewise a dedicated application should adopt a private or hybrid cloud.3.3 Cloud computing services modelsCloud computing providing a comprehensive services from hardware to applications and all this services may be grouped into three categories Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) as per Appendix 12. Organization will choose a cloud service based on the organization specific business, technical, and operational requirements.SaaS is a model that offers software as service over the internet. SaaS eliminates the need to install and range the application on the client hardware. PaaS providing a computing platform as service which compliance of cloud infrastructure and cloud applications. IaaS services deliver a virtualization platform for computer infrastructure.The top cloud computing providers such as virago, Google, 3Tera, etc are shown in Appendix 13.3.4 Cloud computing trendsCould computing isnt a new technology or a new architecture its a new delivery model. This model is still an evolving paradigm. As per NIST, cloud computing definitions, use cases, underlying technologies, issues, risks, and benefits will be refined in a spirited debate by the public and private sectors. These definitions, attributes, and characteristics will acquire and change over time.In general cloud computing is like weather, full with uncertainty but a trend can be observed through it grow. The top ten cloud computing trends of current clouding are as stated below (Appendix 14).3.5 Cloud computing solutions3.5.1 virago Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2)Amazon EC2 is a specialise IaaS by where it provides a sizeable computing capacity to an organization through clouding. Amazon EC2 with the pay-per-use concept allow an organization to scale up and down as per the latest computing requirement by only paid for capacity the organization actually use. It saves the involve for an organization to spend severely on its IT infrastructure in order to operate its business processes. Amazon EC2 allows an organization to have complete control over the selected combination of instances, operating systems and software. With the highly reliable environment and numerous securing mechanisms, Ama zon EC2 providing an assurance service to an organization. With the Amazon CloudWatch, an organization can had an overview of its resources utilization and performance at own pace. This solution is suitable to be adopting by Carsem as it coherent with the business processes and environment requirement.3.5.2 Google App EngineWith its specialties in PaaS, Google App Engine enables an organization to develop and entertain applications on the cloud platform without the needs for the organization to hold any server. With no set-up costs and recurring fees, an organization will only need to pay on the resources such as storage and bandwidth that are use by organization to support those applications. Google App Engine with its ability to automatic scaling enables an organization to scale up and down according to its current needs.3.6 Cloud computing benefits and costs clouding able to reduces organization hardware and boilersuit IT expenses, apart from the benefits of pay-per-use. With t he scalability of the clouding, organization may choose to expand its storage without the needs to pay an expensive price for the hardware and the programs. The availability of Cloud solutions enables an organization to run project at own ease and increase the deployment of new products. There is no payment needed by the organization on the future updates due to clouding provide automate updates services.Clouding reduces IT focus on system administration work such as manage servers and application upgrades and channel their skills in integrating the legacy system with the new cloud solution. The availability of templates allows the implementation and deployment of cloud services is much easier and minimizes the needs of IT. Clouding also enable users to access and updates information anywhere as their own convenience.Data are being managed and protected by the delicate vendors and the amounts of infrastructure needed had been the responsible of the cloud providers. This will ease t he pain in the ass of an organization in deciding on the purchasing and the maintenance of the infrastructure base on the rapidly increasing workload. With the high secure infrastructure by the cloud providers, an organization is being relief off the infrastructure disaster such as power lines cut off, flooding, fire, security, etc.Clouding able to reduce the run time of an applications and enable the batch jobs to be completed in a short time frame so that management able to make a prompt decision.As the cloud services is provided via internet, internet service loss may result an organization unable to perform its business processes or unable to make a prompt decision. Due to the physical infrastructure locations is unknown to the organization, the data and information might run at risk of not be compliance with local privacy requirements. Apart from that organization might run at a risk that the data being expose to others users especially for public cloud which might had hundred s to thousands user.Organization might loss of control over its storage due to had no insight of cloud provider accident procedures whether there are any backup, restore and disaster recovery. Organization might run into cloud providers that are using different application programme interface which resulting both application unable to synchronize.Below table total a list of benefits and costs in running cloud computing.4. CLOUD COMPUTING ADOPTIONCarsem need to find into consideration forces such as market demand, business strategy, IT department strategy, IT assessment and competitors IT infrastructure related services in the implementation of cloud computing.4.1 Market demand for Carsem servicesSemiconductor industry had been growing in a pace and face continuous demand for products. In order to maintain its position in the market, Carsem needs to ensure that its customers, suppliers and employees are satisfied with the services provided.Currently Carsem facing with the challe nges of maintain a unassailable rapport with its customers by where queries unable to be attend on time and customers facing a hard time in getting a real time product status via extranet established by Carsem. Apart from that suppliers also having difficulty in monitoring the black materials inventory level for a prompt replenish due to no inventory tracking system established.There is no real time data shared with the oversea sales team which will enable the team to make an on time potential sales decision due to the data are locked away with the factory. Mean while information availability to the in house employees to make an immediate disposition is an existing challenge, as the information is only made ready(prenominal) to a specific level of employees with granted access right.4.2 Carsem business strategyCarsem goal of maintaining as a leading semiconductor sub-contract assembly house by providing energy defects products in a reasonable pricing achievable through a series of strategy such as maintaining a good relationship with the customers, continuous improvement system towards zero defects, quality control measurement, on-going research and development of high-technologies products and comprehensive monitoring system.In order to maintain a good relationship with customers, on time delivery and products information profile need to made available. To further impress the customers, Carsem employees will need to be able excel in operational, services and technology delivery. A good monitoring system will ensure that the product deliver on time with zero defects, never the least ensure that Carsem inventories is in a healthy state. Continuous improvement system such as employee insinuation system (ESS) or operators advancement training program will ensure that the employees equipped with needed information for their job.4.3 Carsem IT department strategyIT department is a crucial department in driving Carsem business strategy to meet with market dema nds. The department prior tactic is to conduct a end-to-end analysis by department basis to understand each department requirements and access needs towards the use of information system. The result will enable the IT department to create a fitting system to drive the business strategies smoothly to achieve information sharing and better decision making. then total cost ownership (TCO) analysis is needed to justify to which extend an investment is needed. TCO included direct costs and indirect costs such as software and hardware acquisition cost, setup cost, maintenance cost, infrastructure cost, downtime cost, space and energy cost associate with non other the hiring cost. Management will be able to make a wise decision base on the TCO analysis.4.4 IT assessmentIT department strategy will lead to the need of IT assessment, as an appropriate IT tools are key to IT strategy success. IT assessment will be consisting of an inventory check on the current IT infrastructure available in house in comparison to IT infrastructure needed in association of the IT strategy drawn. The assessment will also need to take into consideration whether the IT infrastructure compatible with individual department needs. Apart from inwrought assessment, external assessment is also critical. A comparison also need to be carry out between IT infrastructure suppliers to enable a better choice taking into consideration the factors such as cost, support, standard, licensing etc. IT department need to ensure that there is a database information available persistence to customers IT infrastructure so that Carsem data and information successfully enjoin to customer.The most common systems used in today market included ERP system, data mining system, information sharing system, reporting system to dethaw current challenges faced by Carsem effectively with future expansion thusly cloud computing will be the optimum environment to run above mention system.4.5 Competitor services and invest mentIn scathe of the hardware platform, Carsem nearest competitor is engaged with Dell and conducting with dos system for its software. In general, Carsem and its competitor are offering the same standard of services to its stakeholders. To a certain point, Carsem competitor had a better system by where they had establish a share point system by where it allows employees to transfer and share documents thru share point portal. In term of the operation system support, Carsem is gaining an advantage as Carsem had engaged with MES system compare to its competitor which still yet to develop to the MES.5. CONCLUSIONS5.1 RecommendationsCarsem should go for cloud computing to be at the edge of competitive advantage. Cloud computing solutions such as Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), Google App Engine are suitable to be adopted by Carsem. The stated clouding solution will ease off the burden such as managing issues, financial costing, and maintenance puzzle and in the mean time promote a secure environment for data storage and enable the user to access whenever and wherever they like.5.2 summary of findingsCarsem had been rapidly growing to achieve competitive advantage in the semiconductor industry. Through the competitive forces model, it is get to know that Carsem is facing with the problem of comforting its stakeholders due to the incompetence IT infrastructure. Carsem will also need to ensure that both its business strategy and IT strategy are aligned to meet with the markets demand. special knowledge of its competitors services and IT infrastructure investment are some essential forces in determining Carsem success.Challenges identified associate in managing Carsem IT infrastructure can be grouped into three categories which are management, organization and technology perspective. Carsem need to realize that information system is the key for solving business problems. As such information system needs to be managed wisely to gain competitive advantage in t he market. Information delivers on time will save up time and in turn resulting in cost saving.