IBM Connections: The way to go social

BANGALORE, INDIA: "The current set of collaboration tools starting with e-mail is not going to be enough to do everything. Body of knowledge is what is necessary today, so we started building tools for collaboration," notes Alistair Rennie, GM, Collaboration Solutions, IBM Software Group.

During an interaction with Anil Kumar R of CIOL on the sidelines of IBM Interconnect 2012 event in Singapore, he talks about the company's social collaboration platform Connections and why is it relevant in the present IT scenario. Excerpts:

CIOL: What is IBM's social business solution for large and mid sized organizations?

Alistair Rennie: Today we are in a Post PC Era, we have seen several social tools that are available today. Social is not something that is 'Unique' but is 'Embedded in Business'. Clients today have end point devices - from Apple, Blackberry 10, Windows 8 to Android - that are mobile in their enterprises. IBM is building value on these platforms.

IBM is transforming into a 'Globally Integrated Enterprise'. With so many different teams which are doing different projects, it has become clear to us that the current set of collaboration tools starting with email is not going to be enough to do everything. Body of knowledge is what is necessary today, so we started building tools in collaboration.

IBM began to invest in the social media with a product called Connections in 2007 and have been steadily investing in it. Connections allows real time sharing, with tools such as Rich Profiles, with which organizations can go beyond names and designation and can now expand to areas of expertise, connect them to projects, communities and customers and so on.

Think about a social network which is beyond the current collaboration tools where organizations can find real time help, expertise, community connect and using this to enhance business productivity. IBM works with its customers towards great business purpose, not just to collaborate, but also to differentiate and change business. For example changing customer care in banks and reducing product design cycle time.

The next phase is not just to use these collaboration tools. But, will be also to know how to work on the social platform with your employees. This is not like the traditional hierarchical way of working, where you work with your clients.

CIOL: How is IBM Connections different from the various other open and free collaboration platforms already available today?

Alistair Rennie: For an enterprise integrating with other systems is important. Connections has APIs to connect with the social world. Customers using SAP, or Oracle Financials can connect with customers on different levels through it. Sensitive works of clients can be in a private setting.

From a security perspective, regulated industries such as finance and banking cannot risk public settings and unknown connections. The security element for IBM is built in. The technology allows more and more global access to all devices and platforms. The most important is business analytics that is available to customers.

CIOL: How much time does it take to implement social platform into an organization business?

Alistair Rennie: Once the business problems are identified, it takes a couple of months to get started. With Pure Systems the implementation time will be short. Buyers are from all departments of the organization.

The drivers of change in organizations are also from HR and marketing departments. The chief of HR, CMO and operational heads are also seeking solutions to problems. They are also becoming champions in many cases. Almost 60 of the Fortune 100 companies have IBM Connections installed. We have a leadership position in enterprise wide social integration.

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CIOL: What is going to be the biggest challenge for organizations to think and work on a social environment?

Alistair Rennie: Technology is not complicated. Real work is in adoption. This working is going to be a culture shift for many organizations. There is no hierarchy. Anybody can comment, ideate, like or dislike ideas and concepts. Bringing all this together demands an adoption openness and championing from the CEO himself and downwards. That is going to be a bigger challenge.

CIOL: What is going to be the biggest gain for customers intending to embed social into their business?

Alistair Rennie: The value in terms of investments would pay for itself in a matter of months and in some cases couple of years. The key is capability and speed that moves up. Today, CIOs and business drivers do not want to wait for a long period of implementation. Time to deploy is short. From a solution's perspective customers expect things to be complete.

So the technology infrastructure with expertise we are releasing a new version of Connections by the ned of October, which will have all these features.

CIOL: Can you give us an example of a customer who has directly benefited from using social in their business outcome?

Alistair Rennie: Cemex, a company based out of Mexico, had a business problem which was to cut the life cycle of product release by 50 per cent. There are several other examples, such as Asian Paints in India has begun to use Connections.

CIOL: How would Pure Systems help users who have already invested in virtualization and other solutions?

Alistair Rennie: With Pure systems one can continue with what they have built. Virtualization on its own only takes you to an extent, because you still have infrastructure management, configuration to deal with. Pure Systems takes that in and pushes it to the next level as it takes care of all the configurations, managements, settings etc. Moreover, you may have the image of the the database, or websphere but what you want is an optimized system for high scale client access. We can bring it all together in Pure Systems.

Our vision of the system is much more complete. Our commitment from the core platform to the scalable deployment of real patterns of expertise being able to deliver insights for better business results is unique.

CIOL: How do you visualize future of IT infrastructure?

Alistair Rennie: People look for app patterns for cult experience, specific highly sophisticated systems, integrated content management systems, access control, mobility. So the pressure on highly sophisticated systems is going to increase. People are going to continuously look for a range of deployment options.

On one end you may have financial institutions wanting to do this on their own as it is their core and may choose to integrate it themselves. Or you may have a certain set of application patterns and deploy it in the Pure Systems. And then take advantage of the pre-configurations in a data centre. Or making the same applications availability in a private cloud or others may want separate applications on a public cloud infrastructure.

We are going to see more and more focus on capability, common view of capability and a consistent set of deployment options based on different trade offs that clients are looking for.

(Anil Kumar R is Group Editor & Senior Vice-President of CyberMedia (India) Limited and was hosted in Singapore on IBM's invitation)