CIOs: The Econalypse Ate Our 2009 Budgets

John Paczkowski — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 18:30:04 +0000

No surprises here. The econalypse has sent IT managers scrambling to redraft their already diminished 2009 budgets. About 42 percent of chief information officers have cut their budgets to grapple with the souring economy, according to a new survey by Gartner (IT). However, 54 percent have kept their budgets flat and an enviable four percent have actually raised them. Gartner reports that in March and April of this year, budgets declined by a weighted average of 4.7 percent. That’s quite a bit different from the firm’s earlier prediction of generally flat spending for the first quarter of 2009. As Gartner’s Mark McDonald told Forbes, “It’s almost as if Jan. 1 started on April 1. [CIOs] re-did their plans in the first quarter once they understood what the global financial crisis would mean to them.”

Interesting. So, given the continuing volution of the financial crisis, can we expect further budget adjustments in the future? McDonald doesn’t think so. “CIOs gave us every indication that the budgets they have now are the budgets they will have for the rest of the year,” he said. “The number who have a contingency plan is only about half, and most of those CIOs don’t believe they’re going to have to execute those contingency plans….Of the CIOs we surveyed, 38% expect to see a recovery by September 2010, and another 32% expect a recovery by March of 2010. Only 24% said it would be beyond September 2010.”

Alcatel-Lucent: Let's Get Small

John Paczkowski — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 16:50:56 +0000

Alcatel-Lucent, the world’s largest maker of telecommunications equipment, won’t be quite so large come 2009. This morning the struggling Franco-American network supplier said it plans to sack 1,000 managers and 5,000 contractors in a bid to bring down costs. “The new management team is committed to rapidly executing this new strategy and leveraging the new streamlined organization,” CEO Ben Verwaayen said in a statement. We are focused on delivering results and restoring profitability.”

This latest swing of the ax brings total job cuts at Alcatel-Lucent (ALU) to about 22,500 since the 2006 merger that created it. And though the company will be leaner and meaner for it, that new found agility won’t count for much without a shift in business strategy bold enough to reverse the brutal reduction in market share and market capitalization Alcatel-Lucent has suffered. And an oblique and, frankly, baffling mention of Web 2.0, does not a business strategy make.

Alcatel-Lucent’s plan is to “combine the trusted capabilities of the network environment with the creative communications services of the Web (Web 2.0, Web 3.0 and beyond).” What the hell does that mean?

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CIOs: The Econalypse Ate Our 2009 Budgets

Alcatel-Lucent: Let's Get Small