MIS100 2012: Bubbling under

Despite an admittance last year that 2012 may be a tougher year for Bay of Plenty Polytechnic (BoPP) than 2011, IT manager Rabindra Das reports that ICT budgets and staff numbers have again increased, supporting the education provider in its quest to provide a leading and exceptional learning environment to its approximately 12,000 students. 

Replacement of the student management information system (SMIS) remains at the forefront of ICT plans, as does a FMIS upgrade using Realtime.

“IT will support business objectives by assisting with the implementation of a new SMIS and a new finance system,” says Das.

In 2010, the polytechnic committed to a significant upgrade of its network to provide faster, more reliable access to the internet and Karen networks. Following on from that development, BoPP began investment in a fully meshed wireless solution at the start of 2011, in partnership with Business Technology Group (BTG).

BTG implemented a Motorola wi-fi network solution using a next generation wireless platform and Motorola Air Defence.

The service provider also assisted in the integration of a student-focused quota management system, Lightwire, which allows students metered internet access under a fair-use policy across wireless and wired networks.



Sovereign
2011 ranking: Not listed

Senior IS executive: Kevin Leith, CIO
Address: Sovereign House, 74 Taharoto Road, Takapuna
Website: www.sovereign.co.nz

New Zealand insurer Sovereign provides personal and business life insurance, health insurance, home loan, investment and superannuation products to more than 650,000 customers across the country. The organisation has a new CIO, as of March this year, in Kevin Leith, who moved internally to the role from his previous position of general manager operations.

ICT budgets, projects are all up on last year, by as much as 5 percent. This will allow for key investments to be made in mobility solutions, wireless, social media, business intelligence, virtualisation and CRM. Cloud computing and business continuity/DR projects initiated last year are in maintenance now. At the top of the ICT projects list for 2012 are a CRM replacement, deployment of new quoting software, significant business intelligence initiatives, and legacy migration.

In 2012, Sovereign will also complete a Microsoft SharePoint Server 2010 project to consolidate to a single platform and create a new website and intranet. The previous website was based on an outdated web content management system. Content was highly static, navigation was cumbersome for users, and the site did not achieve high rankings in search engines because content wasn’t tagged with descriptive metadata. However, the new site has led to stronger customer connections, enhanced visibility of sales leads, and improved collaboration and information access. Sovereign is now able to update its sites three to four times faster, allowing IT to focus more time on strategic tasks.

In the future IT will be used to increased agility, productivity, efficiency, customer service and experience, improve mission critical systems and reduce risk, says Leith.