VAR500: Accenture Bets On Enterprise Social Media; TCS Takes Flight

VAR500 Solution Providers In the News

IT solution provider Tata Consultancy Services bidding on a top airline's IT business -- a move that, if successful, could cause TCS' revenue to soar. In other VAR500 happenings, Infosys hires an exec from a rival firm, Accenture shares its social media knowledge, and SHI makes a deal to expand its cloud computing offerings. CSC and Dimension Data made news as well.

TCS Flying High With Lufthansa

VAR500 solution provider TCS is bidding $500 million for a controlling stake in the IT unit of the airline Lufthansa, according to industry reports.

If accepted, the deal could bring $2 billion in revenue to TCS; TCS would own 80 percent of the company, the remaining 20 percent would likely be retained by employees. A competing bid from IBM is also being considered, the sources said. Lufthansa IT Systems reported $850 million in 2010 revenue and has roughly 3,000 employees.

Infosys Replaces Chief Of Global Immigration

Infosys has replaced its chief of global immigration with the former immigration head at competitor Wipro Technologies, according to The Wall Street Journal. Vasudeva Nayak, will replace its chief of global immigration, Eshan Joshi, who has taken a sabbatical, according to WSJ sources. Nayak was a vice president at the global outsourcing unit of Wipro, handling compliance, relocations, overseas allowances and medical insurance, among other work. He comes to Infosys as it is facing a lawsuit and an inquiry by a U.S. Senate subcommittee for alleged violation of work visas. Infosys has denied any wrongdoing and said that it is cooperating with the investigation.

Accenture Opens Enterprise Social Media Doors

The Accenture Enterprise Social Media Innovation Center has opened its doors. IT solutions developed by the center will help enterprises leverage social media internally—to support collaboration, reduce cycle time and create online work teams that serve customers better—as well as externally—to help business-to-business and business-to-consumer companies improve their interactions across marketing, sales, service and operations. Based in the Accenture Technology Lab in Silicon Valley, the Accenture Enterprise Social Media Innovation Center will work with salesforce.com as well as other providers of social media tools to develop, demonstrate and deliver first-to-market solutions and capabilities.

SHI Cruises To The Cloud

IT solution provider SHI International is partnering with cloud computing vendor Cloud Cruiser to offer customers secure, high performance and industrial-grade computing solutions that will deploy critical workloads from internal production to the cloud. SHI's Data Center Infrastructure design offers Managed Private Clouds, Private or Dedicated Clouds and Multi-Tenant Clouds. With Cloud Cruiser's cost management solution, enterprises can optimize capital as well as operational costs in hybrid cloud computing environments across SHI's managed private, private and public clouds. Spending on public IT cloud services is predicted to grow at more than five times the rate of the IT industry as organizations move a wider range of business applications into the cloud. Managing those costs will become a greater importance to companies as they move more workloads to the cloud.

CSC Taps Veteran For Health IT

30-year CSC veteran David Levitt will become vice president of health information technology solutions (HITS) for the IT solution provider's North American Public Sector (NPS) Health Services Division. Levitt will be responsible for developing new business with key federal health agencies. He served most recently as the account director for the HITS business unit, including collaborations with the Department of Veterans Affairs, among other government agencies.

Dimension Data Targets the Data Center

Dimension Data launched its Data Centre Networking Assessment service, which helps customers implement a data center built with future IT strategy and business objectives in mind. Clients can review their existing network architecture in the data center, along with their data center strategy and business goals. During three phases of assessment, the VAR500 IT solution provider works with clients to determine their operational and strategic competencies, their data center strategy, and the network architecture in support of that strategy.