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APEJ CIOs Face New Breed of Challenges: Innovate, Drive Revenue, Help Manage Cashflow and Improve Business Processes in 2010 and Beyond, says IDC

Singapore, July 27, 2010 – Preliminary results from IDC's annual Asia/Pacific Dynamic IT Benchmark 2010 reveal that the role of the CIO is evolving into a position more tightly aligned with business drivers. With more and more CIOs receiving KPIs linked to business priorities such as cash flow management, revenue generation and product/process innovation, the fundamental role of IT is shifting. Results of the study will be revealed at IDC's regional CIO Summit which will take place in 10 cities across Asia/Pacific between July-August 2010. The Singapore leg will take place on July 29 and 30, 2010.

"With the changing economic climate, CIOs are using a higher percentage of their 2010 ICT budget to develop and fund projects that increase business profitability and drive improved customer service performance. This reaffirms the changing role of CIOs today; the new breed of CIOs are expected to drive revenue growth instead of merely keeping their business running," says Dr. Patrick Chan, Chief Technology Advisor, Emerging Technologies, Practice Group at IDC Asia/Pacific.

Recent findings from the survey reveal that:

• Interest in cloud computing is high with 44% of the respondents indicating interest to initiate cloud computing projects in their organizations within the next year. However, interest in private cloud (cloud computing environments dedicated to the exclusive use of one organization) and virtual private cloud is considerably higher with approximately 6:1 preference over a public cloud option.
• 59% of respondents report that scalability is the core focus of their IT refresh strategies this year. Hence, rapid provisioning is critical in many situations as CIOs need to respond to dynamic changes in the business environment.
• 46% of the respondents are planning to increase self-service IT in their businesses. By facilitating their employees to take responsibility of their own ICT needs, enterprises can free up ICT resources to focus on new, innovative initiatives that drive profitability, help manage cashflow and provide tangible customer service improvements.
• Organizations are actively reviewing methodologies (e.g., Information Technology Infrastructure Library v3) to optimize core IT processes and resources for the purpose of differentiating their businesses. IDC observes that enterprises that have adopted these methodologies early in their IT change management programs are achieving better operational efficiencies and governance in the area of security and regulatory compliance. These organizations also react faster to market changes and are able to promptly launch new business services to engage customers when the opportunity arise.
• Social networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter are gaining traction among the respondents. Initiatives to align social networks with business objectives have also been launched in some of these organizations. 55% of the executives say they are currently leveraging social media network to aid in certain areas of their decision making. 64% indicated that reliance on web-based networks and online communities have increased significantly in their organizations during the past year. Increasingly, enterprises are leveraging social networks platforms for the purpose of validation and crowdsourcing for activities such as for beta testing of services/products, customer relationship management, focus group research among others. As a result, these organizations have become more agile. Some innovative enterprises are leveraging Twitter for internal relations and the result is improved communication and employee engagement.

Details of the survey results will be revealed at the Singapore leg of IDC's Asia/Pacific CIO Summit 2010 which will take place on 29th and 30th of July.

At this summit, IDC will be announcing the Singapore winners of the IDC-Enterprise Innovation Award 2010. This award recognizes Asia's organizations for the novelty, execution and vision of their IT initiatives. For more information about the IDC-Enterprise Innovation Award 2010, click here.

IDC will also be taking the opportunity to launch InTEP (Information Technology Experience Program) at the Summit. The objective of the program is to help CIOs address major strategic and operational challenges in their organizations, as well as identify opportunities to grow their businesses through regular face-to-face forum discussions with peers and IDC's analysts. InTEP also offers CIOs exclusive access to IDC's analysts for technology and business advisory as well as a global online community portal that includes research papers and best practice case studies.

About IDC's Asia/Pacific CIO Summit 2010

In 2010, IDC's Asia/Pacific CIO Summit is being held across 10 cities in Asia/Pacific and sees CIOs and senior level IT decision makers from the region come together to discuss, debate and derive winning strategies to take their businesses forward. The summit brings together fresh perspectives from IDC, the best minds from resilient enterprises, and collective intelligence from top business leaders in the Asia/Pacific region to address the challenges today. Based on exclusive inputs from CIOs, IDC has developed cutting-edge topics and for this summit. For more information about the summit, visit http://www.idc.com.sg/CIO_Summit2010.

About IDC's Asia/Pacific Dynamic IT Benchmark Survey & IDC-Enterprise Innovation Award 2010

The purpose of IDC's Asia/Pacific Dynamic IT Benchmark 2010 survey is to understand how organizations in Asia/Pacific are refreshing their IT methodologies and tools in order to compete more effectively. It seeks to identify emerging trends, methodologies and hot focus areas that are relevant for business and IT executives in this region. Till date, over 400 Asia/Pacific CIOs from Australia, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam have participated in this survey. The survey is ongoing and all CIOs and senior level IT decision makers are invited to participate. Interested parties can contact Dr. Patrick Chan at pchan@idc.com.

About the IDC-Enterprise Innovation Award 2010

The IDC-Enterprise Innovation Awards 2010 is in its fourth year running. This award recognizes Asia's organizations for the novelty, execution and vision of their IT initiatives. One talented IT leader will also be named CIO of the Year. For more information about the IDC-Enterprise Innovation Awards 2010, click here.