ACQUISITIONS & DIVESTMENTS - WANG GLOBAL, OLIVETTI AND GETRONICS

Wang was an early and highly successful player in office automation. It expanded out of its core business into main stream computers, and in the process built a separate service organization to support its full range of products which, by the late 1980's included PCs and servers. Ultimately it failed to weather the competitive storm, and went into chapter 11 bankruptcy, emerging as a computer service company. I was head-hunted from Digital by the new management team, led by Joe Tucci, who is now CEO of EMC. Joe's strategy was to rapidly grow through acquisition, and by the time I arrived, the company had completed several acquisitions, building the revenue to $1.5B. In the process it was rebranded to Wang Global, and re-focused on services around computer networking. My early work with Wang Global was to reposition the company to extensively use Microsoft technology, and by implementing this internally, I was able to not only rationalize the various technologies for the acquired companies, but build a benchmark beating example of the very services Wang Global offered. In parallel I worked the companies critical alliances with Microsoft and Dell, in addition to working major customer relationships (including the US Postal Service and The Hartford Insurance company). Additionally I migrated the expertise and methodologies developed in the internal implementation, to the customer facing organizations, and did numerous presentations and publicity gigs to promote Wang Global and its allies products and services.

Olivetti's $2.5B European centric service business was the "last big computer service fish" of the 1990's. Shortly after I joined Wang as CIO, we acquired this sprawling, mismanaged and highly demotivated International $2B behemoth. The challenge was to quickly integrate Olivetti with our own $1.5B International business to realize the acquisition's economic and competitive logic. As CIO/CTO I was part of the due diligence team, visiting and reviewing each Olivetti service company business - these stretched across Europe to Japan. As a result of this work, I developed a plan to (i) deliver a 50% IT cost reduction from the merged organizations; (ii) implement a single differentiating global service and administrative platform and (iii) exit Olivetti's major IT outsourcing contract. Additionally, I would extend our best-in-class infrastructure to the merged company - the infrastructure reflected the global services being sold and delivered to customers. All of these goals were achieved, with varying degrees of difficulty and surprise. Shortly after integration was complete, Wang Global put itself into play - with three companies interested in acquisition. I was part of the Wang Global team that ultimately sold the company to Getronics for $2B cash.

REWIRING THE ORGANIZATION - SCHLUMBERGER & SHELL

Schlumberger ($100B Market Cap) is fundamentally an information company. It's core oil field services business, recognized as the leading global oil field service company, worked across all stages of well life cycles. At the exploration stage, Schlumberger collects and converts vast quantities of seismic information to help its clients develop succinct exploration plans. They drill exploration & production wells for clients, and optimize drilling and production wells through logging, stimulation and completion service. Initially, based in London, I managed and decentralized IT services for Dowell Schlumberger. I was then transferred to Houston and ran the internal consulting office there, and for a year the California office. In addition to running projects, typically operational and strategy engagement, in the oil field services businesses, my team and I worked in Schlumberger's semiconductor business (Fairchild), the CAD/CAM businesses and several of the measurement and controls businesses (meters, smart cards etc.) Typically internal consulting (aka Internal Audit) did very high level assignments using high potential Business School graduates (from Harvard, Stanford etc.) - the results of which were presented to senior managers. Consultants were typically promoted out of consulting and into fast-track positions in the organization.

One major review my office did, was of a plan to develop a global network that would allow the already technology savvy organizations to work more effectively, and with other Schlumberger organizations, customers and key partners. I led this review, concluding that such a network, if built correctly, would not only save significant cost, but would position the company strategically ahead of its competitors. The investment ($100m at todays cost) was approved, and I unwittingly was appointed to run the programme by Schlumberger's CEO. In took less than three years to build the global network using BBN, who was then developing the early internet and built/operated many of the US defense department networks. The network, which included global email services, met and exceeded the predicted benefits and within a year of its completion, caught the attention of Shell who asked for a briefing, and specifically for me to do the briefing. In the interim, I had taken charge of the network security products and services business development, in the Paris based Smart Card division. Within four weeks of the briefing, which was attended by Shell's head of Exploration & Production, I was offered and accepted a place on a strategic advisory team working directly for Shell's Committee of Managing Directors. Our work was two fold - using technology for Europeanization, and re-thinking the communication and knowledge processes of the then $123B company. Once our recommendations were accepted, I was appointed Head of Planning and Development for Shell's more elaborate network initiative. By the end of my three years with Shell, the core of this was built and implemented, the benefits (savings of $16m+ per year in communications costs, and a strategic and unquantified shift to virtualize knowledge teams and organizations) were proven and I was recruited to Costain (the London based International construction company).

RETHINKING CORPORATE INFORMATION, ITS PROVISIONING AND APPLICATION - COSTAIN ENGINEERING & CONSTRUCTION

Costain, was an International Civil Engineering, Process Plant and Office Building company that operated mainly in the foot print of the British empire. As a Board Director my responsibilities included the Project Consulting Business, the company-wide Information Technology function and Procurement. I arrived just as the business came unglued, and we as the Board had to take drastic action to survive. For my part, I shut down the non-performing consultancy business, refocused the procurement function and restructured the IT function to half its original size. Within two years the resized IT function had become a key business tool, having built client facing capability and got major positive press coverage in the Financial Times and Trade journals. Costain won the Hay/BCS IT award, and in many senses, changed the way the organization operated. As a Board member, I became part of Costain's Private Finance team, that was developing alliances with key consulting engineering companies, potential partners and investment banks. My role, in addition to helping build these alliances was the technology side of actual and shadow tolling, and to that end formed an alliance with the New York Transit authority.The whole concept of having consortia enter into long term relationships to design, build and finance major construction projects fascinated me, and I adapted it to the IT function, with some seven major system development projects done on this basis. These not only served as prototypes for main stream construction projects, but allowed Costain to build IT capability, without having to invest.

FUNCTIONAL OUTSOURCING FOR CHANGE - DIGITAL & EDS

I was recruited by Digital's Global Service Division Head (John Rando) after he heard of the work I'd done in Costain. I joined as VP, CIO Global Services and member of the executive management team reporting to John, when Digital was in the middle of a major shift from high margin computers, to the fast emerging commoditized world of PCs and cheap computer power. Digital Services at that time generated over 1,000% of the corporation's profit, and provided $1B in annual cash flow. Faced with a rapidly changing market place and plunging margins on new service contracts, the Services Division's executive management team recognized that radical change was needed. In my short time with Digital (the company culture nearly drove me mad), I built a service alliance with Microsoft around its Exchange product, and led the charge away from Digital traditional products to Microsoft. With Accenture, I constructed a DBFO agreement for a $250m SAP based logistics system, and a $149m Siebel based CRM system - in both cases I presented the deal to the Executive Board, and got their approval. In addition I negotiated (internally and externally with EDS) the functional outsourcing of all of Digital's service contract administration(estimated cost of over $350m) to improve customer satisfaction (from 55% to 85%) and improve cash flow (taking ten days out of collections). As an off-set side deal, the outsourcing contract gave Digital Services access to EDS controlled $750m service business.