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Why
Outsource | Business
Models | FAQs
Here are some quick answers to your
top of the mind issues on Strategic outsourcing, project
management, development schedules, testing and support
at Aricent . If you have any issue that is
not addressed here, we would be happy to respond. Email
us!
1. How is an Outsourcing
Project initiated?
- An initial team of people visit the
client site to study their systems, understand the
processes and establish good working relationships
for a period of 1-3 months
- Identify areas of work at the offshore
site in India and list infrastructure requirements
- Set up lab with equipment specific
to the customer
- Start with initially defined requirements,
draw up project plan(s)
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2. How are projects managed? Items
addressed: time schedule agreements, variance management
and tracking.
- A project plan having the information
on time lines and schedules is written at the start
of the project, reviewed and agreed upon and put into
configuration management system
- Thereon weekly status meetings are
held to provide an update on the progress and the
updated schedules are communicated to the manager
on the client side and also discussed during the telephone
conference calls
- A joint meeting is held between the
client and the Aricent representative once every quarter
to review the progress
- This meeting also checks on the technical
requirements of the project
- When there are substantial changes
in scope of work and schedule updates, a revised project
plan can be written and shared with the manager on
the client side
- Status reports are sent weekly to the
client with a clear indication of milestones achieved
and forthcoming milestones, issues and concerns with
them
- Weekly status reports identify open
issues and new tasks and estimates for the same. This
ensures good synchronization between the client and
Aricent
- Periodic review of staffing, skills
etc
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3. How is communication between
the client and the development team managed?
- The communication is mainly managed
by having scheduled weekly audio conference calls
with the development teams on both sides
- Conference calls are made, at least
once a week but the number of calls per week is dependent
on the need
- The travel plans are made during project
planning stage in such a way that there is adequate
Aricent representation with the client most of the time
- Typically the Functional Specification/High
Level Design phase is done out of the client site
and then the system integration and testing is completed
at the client site
- Usually it is ensured that a senior
person is available onsite who represents Aricent and
acts as the local liaison between Aricent and the client
for all technical and other issues. This person is
usually the single point of contact and is usually
the project manager
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4. How are requirement changes managed
between the client and the development team? How do you
manage the process? Items addressed are: changing design,
technology, functional specifications and the like.
- Continuous communication is the means
for such tracking
- Weekly telephone calls, e-mails are
typically used to convey changes
- The project manager will evaluate the
impact of the change (which should come from the lead
person on the client side) and specify the acceptance
of the change and the time frames for incorporating
the same.
- The changes are tracked as part of
Defects and Enhancements Tracking System or a Call
Tracker System or as part of weekly e-mails and status
reports
- Having a responsible onsite person
helps in ensuring that change awareness is proper
in the offsite team and their manager
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5. What is the difference between our
FP and ODC business models?
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Fixed Price (FP)
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Offshore Development
Center (ODC)
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Primarily aimed at customers
with specific requirements and well-defined
project plan, this execution model ensures
delivery of the project within a pre-scheduled
time frame at a pre-negotiated (fixed) cost
to the customer
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Mainly aimed at customers
looking forward to building a long term
outsourcing
relationship. This execution model is
more flexible and dynamic with respect to
changes in project requirements and business
objectives
This model incorporates
pool of specialised, multi-disciplinary
resources that are organized and managed
by Aricent to meet the customer's explicit business
objectives |
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FP is a good business model
for a one-time job. It has not been developed
for companies which outsource regularly
This business model
suits one time customers, who don't believe
in outsourcing as a strategy
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ODC is aimed at meeting
the long term outsourcing
strategy for the customers. Provides
ease in operation and works as an effective
and established offshore development strategy
which works like an 'Extension' to your
own teams
Partnership approach
- A 'win - win' strategy
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A big bottleneck in case
of Fixed Price (FP) functioning, is that
every deliverable is bound by guiding and
mandatory documents. Any change in customer
requirement requires a re-look at the documentation,
price, resources. A lot of time is wasted
in operational issues
Not a very flexible
model and increases time to market substantially
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A ODC execution model ensures
operational efficiency vis-à-vis
the FP business model. With a change in
client requirement, ODC model guarantees
a quick ramp-up of resources required for
meeting the new assignment irrespective
of any paperwork/confirmation
Helps reduce the time
to market
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In FP model, Aricent cannot
guarantee a dedicated team for the customer,
people are recruited or dedicated to the
project as and when work comes, which can
lead to project-slippage
People trained on the customer's
line of product might not be available for
the next project, new people would be taken
and re-trained. This leads to waste of time
and resources
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ODC model guarantees dedicated
team trained on clients' Line of business,
systems and processes
Ensures availability of
the best talent right from the very start
Institutionalizes knowledge
across the team
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No infrastructure is dedicated
for the customer. It takes time to pull
in the resources, everytime a new project
is started
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Infrastructure dedicated
to ODC projects. A new project can be started
without any delay
Hardware, software, tools
etc in line with client's development environment
providing exclusive access to 'extended'
teams leading to higher transparency in
management and progress
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Customer has no control
over the specifications once negotiations
are over, since the price, resources are
all based on the assumptions laid out earlier.
Hence changing even a small specification
leads to a fresh round of documentation,
re-negotiation etc
Highly unflexible and
difficult to operate for the customer
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Customer has the ability
to change the specifications at any time
since the ODC acts as an extended arm of
the customer and the customer has full control
over the ODC
Provides full flexibility to the customer
without any operational issues
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FP is not meant to be a
Business model for our long term strategic
partners - does not allow the flexibility
to utilize our project management skills
to the benefit of customer
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Leverages the project management
and organization building skills at Aricent
to Client's advantage. A pool of people
is always dedicated for ODC. Ramp up and
Ramp down of people takes place according
to customer's outsourcing strategy |
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Billing is based on fixed
price and is highly inflexible. Aricent builds
some buffer to cover the risk of project
slippage
Rewards are not passed
on to the customer. In Fixed Price pricing
any savings in efforts becomes our reward
and is not shared with the customer.
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Billing is based on:
- Man month expenses at the rate contracted
- Expenses as approved on actuals for
on site work
The risk/rewards in case
of a ODC functioning mode is shifted to
customers' court. Hence any savings in man-month
or any slippage from planned deadline is
borne by the customer. The pricing is more
Transparent
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6. What is Aricent's support philosophy
and how are bugs handled in services' project?
At Aricent, Support is an integral part of
the offered solution. Associated with each solution
offered by Aricent is a package of Support deliverables
designed to ensure that the customer's investment is
fully protected. Aricent
Support assures the customer continued assistance
in the use and deployment of the Aricent offering over the
short term as well as the long term.
Aricent aims at providing comprehensive support
to its customers across the globe by using the latest
tools and techniques to deliver a consistently fast
response across the full range of post-sales services.
To this extent, support is much more than attending
to bugs and problems, it is the overall process of nurturing
the relationship that started with the project negotiations.
The Aricent Support philosophy is to provide
a single point-of-contact for the customer to coordinate
all deliverables and to champion the customer's cause
as a representative of the customer's own organization
within Aricent. Every individual in the Aricent Support organization
is guided by this objective.
In case of a T&M and ODC business
model, bug-fixing is regarded as another task activity
and executed on an on-going manner, with the customer
billed on actual man-hours spent. While in the case
of fixed price turnkey model, details on warranty phase
and annual maintenance contract are mutually decided
between the client and Aricent.
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7. How are project-specific trainings
conducted at Aricent?
Before the commencement of any project,
the training requirements for the same are comprehensively
planned. All the team members are trained to bring them
up to a comfortable level which ensures timely delivery
of quality work.
A proposed training plan is made for a
specific duration with due importance given to parameters
like topic depth, mode of training, module-duration,
experience profile of the team-members etc. This tentative
plan is discussed with the client to incorporate their
comments. Each session of this plan has a mentor assigned
who is available even after the training to provide
further clarifications or support.
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8. How is the software testing carried
out at Aricent?
One of the key areas of Aricent expertise
in software solutions is Testing.
Aricent has a state-of-the-art testing facility at its headquarters
in Gurgaon, which is equipped to handle various types
of test activities.
Aricent has also gained wide experience in
the field on testing live communication networks, including
Fixed Wireless/ Mobile networks, Transmission networks,
Network Management Systems, Satellite networks and Data
Communication Networks.
The testing team combines
knowledge of telephony, transmission, radio, call processing,
protocols/networking, system integration and embedded
software development. Aricent engineers have experience
in both software and hardware aspects in both a simulated
lab environment and real-life field environment. For
Protocols Stack having different layers with open standards,
each layer is designed to provide basic sets of API
to the peer layer, now to test these type of software,
stubs are developed which call API according to the
standards. Our in-house repository of hardware and software
testing tools further facilitates the software testing.
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