Data center virtualization and its economic implications for the companies

In the current situation of the economic crisis, when companies target budget cuttings in a context of an explosive data growth, the IT community must evaluate potential technology developments not only on their technical advantages, but on their economic effects as well.data centre; virtualization; tiered storage; provisioning software; unified computing.

The Adoption of ICT in Small And Medium-sized Family Business. The Role of Younger Generation

The aim of this paper is to understand if the involvement of younger generation in small and medium-sized family firms can encourage a process of technological innovation, realized through the introduction and use of Information and Communication Technology. Younger entrepreneurs, that we call digital successors, compared to their predecessors, has a higher level of education and, living in an era dominated by electronics and digital information, should be able to exploit the new technologies in business organization and management. The new generation has skills, energy and innovative spirit necessary to start the process of technological innovation. From the methodological point of view, this work is based on a qualitative research involving two case studies. In both the family firms analyzed the involvement of the younger generation promoted the adoption of ICTs. This study is proposed as an initial moment of reflection to better identify some hypothesis to be tested with further investigations and a quantitative analysis.ICT, digital entrepreneur, family business, small and medium enterprises, technological innovation, generational change

Digitization of the manufacturing sector across the EU: assessing readiness for industry 4.0

Dissertation presented as the partial requirement for obtaining a Master's degree in Information Management, specialization in Information Systems and Technologies ManagementIndustry 4.0 is a concept that represents the adoption by industrial companies of techniques and processes allowed by digitization, cloud computing, the internet of things and big data to gain competitive advantages in domestic and global markets. Measuring how the manufacturing sector is adopting Industry 4.0 is challenging, given that there is not a closed definition of the term and that the collection of information is not specifically directed to Industry 4.0 concepts. Recognizing these difficulties, the present study measures the presence of the factors that characterize Industry 4.0 across EU countries. The analysis provides evidence that the existence of a digital infrastructure combined with the analytical capabilities to deal with big data emerge as the two dimensions that show the readiness for Industry 4.0 in each country. At EU level, five homogeneous groups of countries were found, showing large disparities across countries. The implementation of the single digital market strategy with regard to the manufacturing sector demands the collection of more detailed information on Industry 4.0

Digital transformation and business model innovation : a multiple case study of consulting companies from Germany

This dissertation provides a status quo of the digital transformation within the German IT consulting industry in 2022 and examines the influence of digitalization on the business model (BM) development of consultancies. The paper studies the determinants which led consultancies to arrive at their current digitalization level, how their current BMs are characterized as well as how the development process induced by digitalization is composed, and eventually which success factors need to be fulfilled to overcome potential future growth barriers. In the literature review, definitions of the concept of BM and the innovation on BMs are discussed. Based on those insights, the characteristics of BMs in the consulting industry are identified and a deepened understanding of the phenomenon on digitalization is created. Grounded on the theoretical insights, a multiple case study spanning four different IT consulting firms is performed which investigates the business model developments of those consultancies by conducting two semi-structured interviews with related consultants per case complemented with secondary data generating data triangulation. The dissertation identifies changing requirements of stakeholders and in particular clients as the most relevant determinants for business model innovation. The findings of the thesis stress the importance of an outbalanced focus on the people business and the technological aspects of IT consulting. As most critical success factors a change affine mindset and company culture have been identified which embraces that mindset and consequently enables an organizational structure to execute the willingness for change.Esta dissertação fornece um status da transformação digital na indústria alemã de consultoria informática em 2022 e examina a influência da digitalização no desenvolvimento do modelo de negócio (BM) das consultorias. O artigo estuda os determinantes que levaram as consultorias a chegar ao seu atual nível de digitalização, como são caracterizados os seus atuais BMs, como é composto o processo de desenvolvimento induzido pela digitalização, e eventualmente os fatores de sucesso que precisam de ser cumpridos para superar potenciais barreiras de crescimento futuro. Na revisão da literatura, são discutidas definições do conceito de BM e inovação em BMs. Com base nestes conhecimentos, são identificadas as características de BMs na indústria de consultoria ed é criada uma compreensão profunda do fenómeno da digitalização. Com base nos conhecimentos teóricos, é realizado um estudo de caso múltiplo abrangendo quatro empresas de consultoria de IT diferentes que investiga os desenvolvimentos do BM dessas consultorias, conduzindo duas entrevistas semiestruturadas com consultores relacionados por caso, complementadas com dados secundários geradores de triangulação de dados. A dissertação identifica os requisitos em mudança das partes interessadas e, em particular, dos clientes como os determinantes mais relevantes para inovação do modelo de negócio. As conclusões da tese sublinham a importância de um enfoque desequilibrado no negócio das pessoas e nos aspetos tecnológicos da consultoria em IT. Como fatores de sucesso mais críticos, foi identificada uma mudança de mentalidade e cultura empresarial que abraça essa mentalidade e, consequentemente, permite uma estrutura organizacional para executar a vontade de mudança

THE INFRASTRUCTURE OF LARGE ENTERPRISES IN BULGARIA – CHARACTERISTICS AND PROBLEMS

An information infrastructure is part of the overall infrastructure of enterprises. It refers to hardware, software, data management technologies, network and telecommunication technologies and services as well as the staff involved in the management of provided services. The aim of this article is to elucidate the characteristics of information infrastructure and related issues in the era of digital transformation. In terms of theoretical tasks, this implies defining the concept of "information infrastructure" and identifying opportunities for its development. Practical tasks relate to analyzing some of the problems that a large Bulgarian enterprise is facing in terms of its information infrastructure and proposing methods for assessing the costs of the information infrastructure in the enterprise. Our research focuses on ‘Sparky Eltos’ AD in Lovech and suggests some practical guidelines for analyzing problems and offering adequate solutions

Using Virtual Servers to Teach the Implementation of Enterprise-level DBMSs: A Teaching Note

One of the areas where demand has remained strong for MIS students is in the area of database management. Since the early days, this topic has been a mainstay in the MIS curriculum. Students of database management today typically learn about relational databases, SQL, normalization, and how to design and implement various kinds of database applications. Choosing the best database package on which to base the hands-on activities for the class is one of the biggest difficulties of teaching it. Many schools end up using the lowest common denominator which is often a PC-based package such as MS Access. While this package is certainly adequate, basing the whole course on using this one package may be a disservice to the students. This is because in the real business world, the market is dominated by the larger, enterprise-level DBMSs such as Oracle, IBM DB2, and Microsoft SQL Server. However, getting the students access to one of these packages poses a whole series of other problems involving getting academic alliances and maintaining it on a server. This article describes a novel use of a server virtualization tool that is commonly used in the business world to allow students to gain experience in using several of the most popular enterprise-level DBMSs. Students benefit because they get more real-world experience out of the class and gain confidence that their skills will more readily transfer to jobs. Faculty also benefit by having more flexibility in how they can present the material

Healthcare Data Analytics on the Cloud

Meaningful analysis of voluminous health information has always been a challenge in most healthcare organizations. Accurate and timely information required by the management to lead a healthcare organization through the challenges found in the industry can be obtained using business intelligence (BI) or business analytics tools. However, these require large capital investments to implement and support the large volumes of data that needs to be analyzed to identify trends. They also require enormous processing power which places pressure on the business resources in addition to the dynamic changes in the digital technology. This paper evaluates the various nuances of business analytics of healthcare hosted on the cloud computing environment. The paper explores BI being offered as Software as a Service (SaaS) solution towards offering meaningful use of information for improving functions in healthcare enterprise. It also attempts to identify the challenges that healthcare enterprises face when making use of a BI SaaS solution