IBM looking at a new name?

BANGALORE: Which name is dear to the Indian customer IBM India or IBM Global Services India? Media reports hint at a possible name change once the two Indian entities merge. Though the merger itself was a foregone conclusion changing nothing on the ground for the company or its customers, the possible name change may be intriguing. Sources in Sun Microsystems, archrival of IGS globally, put it succinctly. " IBM Global Services is not a India-friendly brand."

"It makes no difference to me. It’s been just IBM for me since 2000," said Shabir Shariff, CFO of Himalaya Drugs who also takes care of the company’s IT strategy. "Whenever I want something I have always called up my support contact in IBM and my requirement is taken care of. I never knew there existed two separate entities." IBM would love to quote Shariff in its marketing pitch and the Himalaya CFO confirms they already do.

The two entities were working in close tandem already with IBM Global Services India (IGSI) extending support activities to every product shipped by IBM India. IGSI also brings much more to the table. It is bigger in terms of revenue than IBM. Going by 2001-02 figures (DQTOp 20 estimates) IGSI had posted Rs 1,012 crore with a 31 per cent growth from the previous year. It was the largest MNC software exporter with a turnover of Rs 733 crore. IGSI gave IBM’s outsourced services in the Indian market a mega thrust with major clients such as Tisco, Ballarpur and ABB.

IBM seems to have brought a long awaited move by merging the two entities. In simple terms the move saves the headache of maintaining two books of accounts, filing different sets of statutory statements with the government agencies such as FIPB and RBI, doing away with revenue transfer between IBM India and IGSI everytime a service pack is shipped with a Thinkpad. Life is easier.

In terms of operations, IBM was already operating as a single unit. So much so that the company requested Dataquest, leading IT publication to consider the two entities as single entity for its Top 20 ranking exercise.

Whether the merger involves any shuffles in the team structure is not clearly known. IBM officials declined to either comment on the merger news or discuss any other issues. In February, PwC India’s consulting partner Amitabh Ray replaced Dr Uday Shukla as the director of IGSI. This follows IBM takeover of PwC globally and to form Business Consulting Services group that works in tandem with IGS.