IT infrastructure and business analytics plan

Assignment Taken

IT & Business Analysis Department : Create an IT plan to support this international expansion.

Case Understanding

Mr. Ramalingam Venkatesh started the venture in the form of a fast-food restaurant in South Bombay in 1965. Due to the political mis happenings in the country in 1975 and food items were being sold at bare prices. TO overcome the situation Ramalingam Foods introduced Instant Mix in different variants to fulfill the demand of varied customers. The product portfolio included Instant Dosa Mix, Instant Idli Mix, Instant Gulab Jamun Mix, Instant Laddu Mix, instant coffee powder Instant Dhokla mix and other similar products. It allowed the venture to operate at a very low cost and they were able to make considerable profits too. Recently there has been demand for their products in the foreign market which is being fulfilled by Indians after domestic it from Indian market and then selling it. Hence in order to capitalize on this situation the venture is thinking to start its business in foreign market. The case is about their international expansion and where they can start from with limited capital and resources.

BCS Solution Summary

IT department will support the expansion of Ramalingam foods by providing various IT services, analyzing the data from multiple departments, and deriving business decisions from the provided analytical data. The scope of IT department will cover IT-Employee policy, Creating Website, Creating Android & iOS application, Social Media handles (technical aspect), ERP-Enterprise Resource Planning, Cyber security, Server system, IT Communication, Networking setup and management, Hardware support, Software support, Cloud Service & Backup system. Thus, IT department will provide technical support and innovative solutions that bring value to the organization to enhance its business processes.

Solution

The IT and business analytics department will look after the online presence of Ramalingam foods and will set up and look after the IT infrastructure its implementation, maintenance, and support. We will be dividing the department into two sub-department, one which will look after the IT and IT infra and the other whole and sole after the analytics, and both the departments will be under the direct command of the CTO.

IT department will look after following aspects w.r.t IT

• IT-Employee policy
• Creating Website 
• Creating Android & iOS application
• Social Media handles (technical part)
• ERP-Enterprise Resource Planning
• Cyber security
• Server system
• IT Communication
• Networking setup and management
• Hardware support
• Software support
• Cloud Service & Backup system

 

IT-Employee Policy

IT department will play a key role in setting up IT user policy for the employees to safeguard the user privacy and data in the company and make sure that the data of any sort generated inside the company facility doesn’t leave the facility.

Some key policies will be

1. Security incident response policy
2. Data encryption policy
3. Mobile device security policy
4. Identity theft protection policy
5. Disaster recovery policy and business continuity plan
6. Remote access policy

Other norms under these policies will be disabling pen drives, personal laptops, personal HDDs, no password sharing, and Laptop/Desktop security monitoring.

 

Creating Website 

In today’s world, no company can survive without an online presence. The IT department will create the website, especially for Singapore and Malaysia. The website will primarily be hosted in English, but there will be an option to convert them to the regional language. The website will showcase the company address, products offered, e-commerce, chatbots, and customer care information. The website will be a dynamic one so that anyone can access it even from a mobile phone.

With a well-designed and well-maintained website with a simple UI, we can gain a competitive ad advantage but building up our brand image and reaching out to more and more people. With this, we will generate online leads and convert those leads into our potential clients. A website will create a sense of trust within the customers, and other customer reviews will strengthen the faith. We will also provide video content about using the product and innovative ways to use them, along with written steps on using the mixes.

The website primarily includes the following aspects:

• Details about the company- history and origins
• Key stakeholders
• Offered Product and product reviews
• E-commerce (online sales)
• Offers 
• Blogs related to health, hygiene, etc
• Chatbot so that customers can resolve their Query
• Testimonials
• Company contacts and customer care details
• Future prospectus

 

Creating Android & iOS application

No company can sustain the competition without having a well-dedicated app that will enable recurring users to buy products from our platform and enjoy certain loyalty rewards. The app will be created for android and iOS users. An excellent dedicated team will look after the app with a minimalistic design and great UI for great UX. The app will be integrated with various payment platforms so that users will find it easy to purchase and easy to make payments.

Social Media handles (technical aspect)

The IT department will look after the technicalities revolving around the social media handles regarding their privacy and security. The analytics sub-department will also look after the social media handle insights provided by the social media platforms.

ERP- Enterprise Resource Planning

There should be a high degree of integration among the system and processes. We need to align the strategy such as order reception, stock check, inventory management, financials, sales, HR, etc.; for this, we need to subscribe to an ERP module, most probably SAP. IT will help to streamline all other processes and support the Analytics department with various data sets.

Cyber security

Cybersecurity is a significant issue in the business world today. Businesses today are vulnerable to cyber-attacks, no matter how big or how small the company is. We will enable devices such as a black box to safeguard the data and install antivirus and anti-ransomware (e.g., Sophos Intercept X) software. These safeguards can potentially save the business. IT professionals will be trained to implement security measures and all the protocols to be followed. “Don’t wait until it’s too late to protect yourself”- Anonymous.

Server system

IT department will try to create a dedicated server room with a server expert whose work will revolve around setting up a server, managing it, troubleshooting, setting up email exchange services, putting up a firewall (e.g., Sophos powerful firewall), and various server security system And, to look after the server administration such as creating new users assigning them company email id and look after the website hosting on our server.

IT Communication

Since the Main Headquarters will be in India, there has to be an accommodation so that people can communicate with each other and there will be a smooth flow of information. For that, we will be setting up tools for Video conferencing and various VOIP devices. We will also set up a CCTV camera so that the CTO can monitor all work from a remote Desktop.

Networking setup 

The main task of the IT department will be setting up the internal computer network with the help of the server and trying to integrate the desktops and laptops to ease the information transfer. They may also have to look after remote desktop connections. They will have to keep a team ready to troubleshoot the network, maintain the network, and stop the network in case of a cyber-attack to safeguard the sensitive information.

Hardware support

All the hardware up-gradation and changes will be facilitated through the IT department who will procure the hardware and set it up. Also, all hardware repair works will be carried out by the IT department.

Software support

All Software licensing, upgrade, and the IT department will look after surveillance. After that, the installation and troubleshooting will be seen over by trained IT professionals. 

Cloud Service and backup system

 We need cloud service when there is a sub-office being set up overseas. There should be a certain level of collaboration between the employees working overseas and in-home ground. This can be integrated by using a cloud service. All files and data can be organized and easily shared among both organizations. We can also use backup systems to mirror the data to avoid any ransomware attack. We may go with Microsoft Azure or Amazon AWS for Cloud services and try to integrate BLACKBOX (product) to perform the task of data Backup.

 

Disaster Recovery System

 Cyberattacks are evolving at a rapid pace. Once such a developed attack consists of crashing the entire system, there is no recovery from the attack. This issue is especially faced by newly established companies who have expanded internationally recently. This attack may result in massive loss to the company due to complete system failure. To safeguard against this, we can set up disaster management and a whole recovery system.

 

 

ANALYTICS TEAM

The analytics department will perform the task of managing the data received from cohort departments and functions and based on that data will give us insights such as demand forecasting, fluctuation in sales, also will analyze the insights from social media handles and help the management to derive decisions to expand the business and get more customer base.

The analytics team will perform the following 

1. Integrating Deep learning tech 
2. HR analytics
3. Demand forecasting
4. Hyper localization
5. Logistics monitoring
6. AI enabling
7. ML integration
8. Customer Feedback Analysis
9. Chatbot operations

To set up this entire facility, the max allocation done to the IT department by the Finance department is 6 CR out of 50 CR budget.

Conclusion

Thus, the IT department will have to create a collaborative ecosystem and work alongside all other departments to expand internationally. It will implement various IT policies and optimize inter-organization functioning as well as between the two headquarters. It will look after all the data security aspects, try to protect sensitive data, and provide all the support to other departments. Cloud services and ERP will lead to the smooth functioning of tasks among the departments. IT department will try to integrate state of the art IT infrastructure into the system to improve and enhance the IT services.

Attached File Details

View Attachment file (TEAM ACES - NMO.pptx)