June 29, 2007. The third BSForum: Innovations and Leaders' Experience in Company Management has been held in Moscow. The main purpose of the event, which IBS set out to pursue when holding the first forum three years ago, is to provide a venue for customers to exchange experiences and opinions in the field of improving efficiency of business management in a variety of industries by implementing corporate applications. This year and for the first time the forum was organized by the two leaders of this market, which served to expand the range of issues discussed and the scope of the most pressing challenges in company management.
Alexei Ananyin, President of Borlas Consulting Group, said: “Information technologies have no value in themselves; they are valuable to a customer only if they help the customer to attain his or her business objectives. This forum is an excellent event for discussing relevance of business objectives and a good opportunity for identifying, with input from all parties involved (vendors, the consultant, customers) the most suitable IT tools to attain those objectives.”
The event was significant for the Russian market in that this single forum showcased all of the best competitive technologies from leading vendors of platforms for building company management systems. Among those taking part in discussions of the development of the Russian market and their vision of future technologies there were Jovan Marjanovic. Managing Director, SAP CIS, Pavel Zakharov, Partner Relations Director, Oracle CIS, Birger Steen, General Manager, Microsoft CIS, Evgeny Velesevich, Cognos Regional Manager for Russia and the CIS, and Pavel Eiges, Technology Director, Documentum Services Russia.
Welcoming forum delegates, all those representing forum partners noted that the large project experience, the accumulated industrial expertise and competencies mean that the merged company is able to shape and develop the market in the interests of customers, as well as to promote advanced solutions for efficient business management. Only a company running powerful practices of business applications implementation based on the core platforms and unrivalled integration experience is capable of retaining confident leadership in this market for years to come.
The forum attracted over 200 delegates from among the top management and heads of functional departments of large Russian companies. Five concurrent industry sections (Finance, Industry, Oil and Gas, Consumer Goods / Retail / Services, and Multinationals) featured presentations providing insights into experiences of implementation and use of corporate management systems by companies of various industrial specializations.
The Finance and Industry sections attracted special interest. In the Finance section, presentations by Trust Bank, VTB 24 Bank, Rosbank and Aviva insurance company, spurred a lively discussion, and the subject of HR management in geographically distributed multi-branch structures attracted the greatest attention. In the Industry section, forum delegates spent a lot of time discussing production management and fixed assets management systems (presentations by Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK) and Ural Steel). The presentation by Sukhoi Design Bureau on automation of management of projects of designing new competitive high-tech products attracted great interest. As usual, delegates were interested in the issue of setting up budget management in holding structures and rollouts of uniform solutions across companies within a holding structure.
Sergey Matsotsky, General Director, IBS, said: "As Russian business matures and faces more advanced challenges, management technologies are expected to meet much more stringent requirements. We take an active role in developing this market and are happy to be able to offer the opportunity for discussing any aspects of using and developing management systems in a dialogue with consultants, customers and designers."
Discussions at the forum were an important step forward in gaining understanding of company needs as regards using information technologies to develop, optimize and support business processes. The understanding gained during the forum will be used in shaping and positioning the merged portfolio of services and solutions of IBS and Borlas.
Next year BSForum will continue the series of events organized by the merged IBS and Borlas company and offer the traditional venue for discussing business efficiency improvement issues and looking for practical solutions in this field.
IBS and Borlas Merged Company Profile:
On April 17, 2007 IBS and Borlas Consulting Group announced merger and formation of the new merged company having estimated FY’2006 consolidated revenue of USD 380 million (US GAAP), the total staff size of over 3,500 (including over 1,500 certified consultants) and over 50% aggregate services proportion in the revenue. 84 of Russia’s top 100 companies are customers of IBS and Borlas Consulting Group. The merged company is the absolute leader in the business applications and management consulting market (over 20% of the market) and the largest IT services company in Russia and Eastern Europe.
For further information please contact Lada Scherbakova, PR Director, IBS, tel.: +7 495 967-8080, e-mail lada@ibs.ru and Vladlen Grigoriev, Head of Public Relations Service, Borlas Consulting Group, tel.: +7 (495) 545-5930 ext 2503, e-mail: press@borlas.ru
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