Background
STC Submarine Systems designed, manufactured and
sold underwater telecommunications systems. With new generations
of systems more
and more functionality was being performed by software. Software
development was contracted out to ICL and the relationship was
not good. Software development became a core skill STC required
in house and having the capability would enable the company to
enter the network management market.
The ICL Software development team was acquired by STC together
with its other software supplier Comsys in Australia. The product
range was expanded to manage both the equipment and network.
STC Submarine Systems was acquired by NORTEL as part of its
acquisition of STC and then sold to Alcatel.
Brief
• To transfer the acquired software unit from ICL
to STC Submarine Systems.
• To acquire Comsys, an Australian software house based in Perth.
• Establish software development as a core skill within the company.
• Reduce cost of development.
• Develop and sell network management systems for managing underwater
telecommunications networks.
My Approach
•
Raise the morale of the team transferring
from ICL. Several key people chose to stay with ICL due to the
unhappy
relationship that existed. Spent time understanding and fixing
the issues and developing a close personal working relationship
with the team at all levels.
• Restructure the department reduce the dependence on contractors
and added a sales capability to address the network
management market.
• Develop a close working relationship between the Australian and
UK based teams, seconding staff in both directions and
developing a single set of products.
• Develop a business improvement culture that enabled sharing of
experience and best practice between the teams.
• Stop the practice of developing a new system every time the cable
technology changed and change the culture to always
think reuse and adequacy.
• Reduce the high cost of installation and commissioning.
• Implement a single configuration control system used by both
UK and Australian teams.
• Implement project management and review processes
• Gain ISO 9000 and later TickIT accreditation. It was not permissible
to transfer ISO accreditation with development units
on acquisition.
Achieved
•
Raised morale of the people transferring from
ICL and developed a good working relationship with the hardware
developers
and manufacturing. Persuaded those key people who refused to
initially transfer to do so and achieved a staff
turnover of around 2% per annum over seven years.
• Restructured and rationalised the department to 85 permanent
staff and 10 contractors working in the UK and Australia with
common standards, tool set and a single configuration management
system. Annual development expenditure approximately £7M.
• Improved accuracy of bidding and forecasting cost and schedule
by collecting and using performance data and standardising
on a single repeatable development process.
• Introduced the use of off the shelf software reducing development
cost.
• Developed 3 generations of network management systems in C and
C++ running on Sun hardware maximising reuse of previous generation
software reducing development cost per new system from £7M
for the supervisory system to £3M for
the full network management product set.
• Reduced the on site installation and commissioning time from
up to 3 months to days with most of the work being done
on line from either UK or Australia.
• Made the Quality System usable, reduced from two shelves of books
to one book. Achieved both BSI 5750 and TickIT
quality accreditation.
• Created underwater telecommunications cable network management
business achieving market leadership. Delivered on time and on
budget 14 underwater telecommunications cable network management
systems to the worlds major international carriers. Customer
surveys showed high customer satisfaction with delivered system
and on going support.
• Closed development units in UK and Australia following acquisition
by Alcatel. Retained staff to complete outstanding commitments
and then redeployed all staff either internally or externally.
Outsourced the ongoing support of delivered systems.
Brian Lewis Profile
An International Business Change Director
experienced in both FTSE 100 companies and the public sector
with core skills in
change management, process re-engineering, information technology
and software development. Impressive record of delivering commitments
and meeting financial targets in a wide range of roles - Business
Turnaround, Channel Development, Business Development, Project
Management - in Europe, USA, Middle East and Australasia
