Empowering partners and system integrators to make them the IT one stop shop

India has emerged as the fastest growing IT market in the world,driven on the increased IT adoption by the domestic market.

India has emerged as the fastest growing IT market in the world,driven on the increased IT adoption by the domestic market along with the increased exports. While the economic slump has had a impact on IT spends globally,India has been fortunate enough to stay away from the influence of the slow down according to a study conducted by Gartner that stated,Indian IT budgets are expected to increase by 5.5 percent in 2009,whereas globally the IT spends re anticipated to see a decline by 4 percent. Further more,the research estimates points to the fact that in the coming times,growth momentum in the domestic market will be led by the significant growth in the packaged software and service business and this in turn will exert tremendous pressure on Indian companies to adopt and implement better and faster IT applications.

The increased demand foreseen in the industry will create a perfect environment for Partners like Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) and System Integrators (SIs) to work closely with the known IT players and act as a major provider of complementary applications to companies across industries. Sectors like financial institutions,p pharmaceutical,healthcare and textile have already been hugely benefitted by ERP,CRM implementations and system integration.

According to a research conducted by IDC,successful partners recognize that two of the primary business success factors,revenue growth and customer satisfaction,are interrelated,with the latter underpinning the former. To identify new ways to improve customer satisfaction and increase revenue,Microsoft has developed a partner engagement program that empowers both the ISV and SI partners with the latest technology to boost customer satisfaction and increase revenue.

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A case in point is that of the two partners of Microsoft,namely Cognizant Technology Solutions (Cognizant) and Proteans Software Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Microsoft has been providing them with support and assistance with the latest technology. Cognizant is a leading provider of information technology,consulting and business process outsourcing services primarily for Global 2000 companies,while Proteans is a global outsourced software product development company that provides outsourcing services to ISVs,SaaS companies,Internet firms and technology companies. Both the companies facilitate their customers primarily with a wide range of services like project-based application services,business and technology consulting,complex system integration,application outsourcing,business process outsourcing,IT infrastructure outsourcing,testing solutions,analytics,ERP,CRM,business intelligence,data warehousing and supply chain management.

To enhance these services,Microsoft introduced Cognizant and Proteans to the newer version of MS CRM and helped them understand the market potential available post-migration to the new CRM platform. Microsoft also helped both the partners by way of extensive instructor-led training,project support,factsheets and documents,and experts were assigned to provide assistance for porting solution onto the latest CRM product through Metro,an early adopter and discovery program for partners. This helped Cognizant and Proteans to upgrade solutions onto CRM 4.0 in relatively shorter time.

With the enablement of Microsoft,Cognizant has developed unique solutions in sales force automation. One such solution,called Territory Planner,allows a company to organize its sales force and field service teams along geographical territories. It fulfills a critical need of pharma manufacturers,logistics and other companies to maximize customer coverage through field-based sales/support teams. Other solutions from Cognizantsuch as Guided Case Management,also built on the Microsoft CRM platformgreatly improve customer experience and productivity of agents in a contact center,by guiding them with intelligent responses during customer calls.

Rajarshi Chatterjee,Director,CRM Practice,Cognizant,said,We are pleased to be a part of the Microsoft program,which complements our single-minded passion of working together with clients to make their businesses stronger and our unique onsite/offshore delivery model infused by a distinct culture of customer satisfaction. With expertise gained through this program,we have been able to devise innovative means of delivery to further delight our customers and explore multiple growth opportunities worldwide. We have also been able to position ourselves well in the sales channel,which has generated good sales opportunity for us. The support and assistance we have received from Microsoft has helped us enhance our market credentials and reputation.

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On their part,Proteans developed an Audit Tool that is used for tracking any changes made to a particular entity record. It keeps a record of the before and after data value changes on any field,the date/time it was changed and the user who made those changes. It also records any entity record created,updated or deleted. A report is generated,which captures all the details of that particular entity.

Sudhakar Gorti,CEO Proteans,said,We are glad that we got the opportunity to be a part of the Microsoft ISV program. This program has helped us immensely in porting our solution in an amazingly quick turnaround time and position ourselves in the sales channel,which,in turn,has led to significant number of sales opportunities. With the overall expertise developed through various Microsoft initiatives,we have been able to generate thought leadership tools and have given webcasts,which have earned a good amount of goodwill in the industry.

Reiterating Microsofts commitment,Moorthy Uppaluri,General Manager,Developer and Platform Evangelism (DPE),Microsoft India,said,Microsoft has always been a partner-driven company and we,at Microsoft,are committed to helping this community,not just in adopting our newer products and platform,but also in being ready to face the ever more challenging business environment. With the various ISV programs like Metro,Innovate ON and Bizspark,we make sure that all our partners are able to avail the benefits of state-of-the-art technology and become a one-stop shop for their customers.