Our strategic IT consulting services are targeted towards progressive SMEs which intend to engage IT beyond merely email and Internet. Our target clients are forward- and outward-looking enterprises which comprehend the need to capitalize on IT, not only for efficiency but more importantly for long-term competitiveness.

Your company may severely lack the technical capability in prevalent technology, qualified IT professionals who can give you CIO-type advice and see through projects, experience in implementing and using IT, intelligence of your competitors’ IT systems, experience in dealing with vendors, confidence due to past failures… you simply do not know where and how to start.

Our suite of strategic IT consulting services is tailored primarily for your needs and budgets. Our aim is to act as your ad hoc CIO (Chief Information Officer), ready to guide you through your most critical IT decisions and initiatives. Critical issues on technologies, solutions, vendors, projects, and licenses are what we will enlighten your management fully. Unlike other IT consultancies, we are not affiliated to any IT company, do not represent any products, nor sell any solutions; therefore, we are fully independent and act in your best interests.

In general, we help our SME clients in the following ways:

	to elevate IT from being merely an operational tool to a competitive weapon
	to engage IT to directly improve both topline and bottomline
	to align your long-term business and IT goals by strategic IT planning
	to make well-informed decisions and maximize returns on investments (ROI) on IT projects
	to structure your IT operations to ensure optimal efficiency
	to adopt the best practices and management thinking with respect to IT
	to re-engineer and align your IT and business processes

a. CIO-Surrogate
b. SME IT Jumpstart
c. Strategic IT Planning
d. Feasibility Study
e. IT Audit
f. Solution / Product Evaluation
g. Independent IT Consulting


a. CIO-Surrogate
This programme is specially tailor-made for SMEs without a strategic IT leader (CIO, IT manager). We understand that the importance of IT has elevated to be a top management concern, even for SMEs. SME’s have a common constraint in hiring a dedicated and qualified IT manager/CIO due to prohibitive salaries and difficulty in attracting and retaining one.

This either results in assigning the IT leadership role to your finance/operations manager or doing without the role totally. In both cases, it leaves your management inadequate in proper IT expertise and planning.

Our CIO-Surrogate programme ideally matches your needs. In this programme, we assign our strategic IT consultants to perform the CIO role for your company. Our IT management consultants are both business and IT competent, are knowledgeable of latest IT products/solutions and understand SME needs.

We will fulfill your CIO requirements as and when it happens. One designated consultant will be assigned to you on a long-term basis. Our consultants can represent themselves as a member of your company and bear your company’s identity. This programme offers a certain number of hours (10 to 100 hours) each month, depending on your package, for your execution of your objectives. You can designate objectives and activities such as:

	Creating, maintaining and executing your strategic IT plan
	Advising your management during management meetings
	Innovating solutions and business process improvements to enhance your competitiveness
	Evaluating solutions/products critically (in terms of cost/benefit, technical and risk perspectives)
	Performing feasibility studies and specifying user requirements
	Meeting, evaluating, negotiating with vendors
	Managing and initiating IT projects
	Recruiting and evaluating IT staff

b. SME IT Junpstart
Our IT Jumpstart programme is designed to accelerate your first major IT adoption. This start-to-end handholding programme helps to alleviate your fear of costly failure, bloated budget and lengthy implementation. The desired outcome of this programme is more efficient operations, better customer response, and greater business agility.

We will first perform a thorough analysis of your company’s competitive environment, supply chain, distribution network and internal operations. Based on the needs of your business, we will source the marketplace for suitable solutions or products and their supporting vendors. We will calculate the total cost of ownership (TCO), measure the total potential gains, and derive the return of investment (ROI). If required, we can assist you in the project implementation by working with the solution vendors, re-designing your business processes and monitoring project status. Everything will be put into perspective in our strategic IT plan specially prepared for your company.

c. Strategic IT Planning
We help you to do strategic IT planning and align IT to your business goals. In layman terms, we will:

	understand your strategic business plans
	conceptualize your IT roadmap
	recommend ways to use IT to enhance long-term competitiveness
	formulate the IT capability required to support the business plans
	identify the gap between the current capability and ideal capability
	plan and prioritize the action plan to progress towards your ideal IT capability
	justify the total cost of investment (TCO)

The Strategic IT Plan will consist of the following deliverables:

	Long-term IT roadmap
	IT-focused business drivers and IT objectives
	Current IT environment; strengths, weaknesses, opportunities
	Gap analysis
	Future IT architecture
	Competitive and industry best practices
	Cost/benefit analysis
	Solution evaluation and recommendations
	Implementation plan

d. Feasibility Study
Before you commit to your major IT initiatives (to procure new systems, develop software, embrace new technology, linkup with suppliers, sign up with a service provider), before you actually make the plunge into costly and unproven investments, we can help you conduct a fully independent feasibility study.

The feasibility study is a wise and small insurance to make before your project commencement, which is also commonly the point of no return. The study will attempt to uncover the hidden details of the project, such as hidden costs, vendor unreliability, technological weakness/risk, potential pitfalls, etc. These hidden factors can considerably affect your decision. It can be a confirmation for the final go-ahead, delay or cancellation decision and be used to seek approval for budget.

e. IT Audit
An IT audit can be performed for several reasons:

	To identify flaws, security and performance issues
	To validate by a third-party that your vendor has delivered the system according to specifications
	To design good standard operating procedures to manage and administer the system
	To improve system operations to better support your manual processes and personnel
	To find ways to optimize system performance and enhance functionality
	To verify the nature of intellectual property for due diligence in a funding, licensing or acquisition exercise
	For litigation purposes

Our versatility and experience allows us to perform a wide variety of audits to suit your needs.

f. Solution / Product Evaluation
We assist our clients to make thorough assessments of IT solutions or products which they wish to adopt. Very often, due to sophisticated marketing tactics of vendors, it is truly hard to pinpoint the actual capabilities and performance of the shortlisted products, let alone to compare them. The factors that make a difference in the final choice are in the finer and unpublished details, such as:

	hidden and conversion costs
	ease of use and customization
	flexibility, security, reliability and speed of software
	quality of vendor support
	level and quality training provided
	availability of qualified local support professionals
	licensing scheme

Customers of these products often discover the true colors of their chosen product only after purchase, when it is too late. It takes a professionally and technically trained expert to attain an accurate evaluation. Our evaluation will provide all the actual information and costs that you need to consider before making a well-informed decision.