Tiffany Wolfe Bus 550 December 7, 2010 1. Established in 1920 in Brussels, Belgium Expanded to the...
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Transcript of Tiffany Wolfe Bus 550 December 7, 2010 1. Established in 1920 in Brussels, Belgium Expanded to the...
WHAT IS UCB? Established in 1920 in Brussels, Belgium Expanded to the U.S. in 1930 2009 total global revenue € 3.1 billion Net sales
51% Europe35% North America14% other
Originally three sectorsFilm (1930-2004)Pharmaceuticals Chemicals
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THE THREE SECTORS Films
BOPP (biaxially-oriented polypropylene) and cellulose films for specialty packaging, labeling, graphic arts and industrial products.
Food and beverages, labels, security products, industrial membranes, health, and pharmaceutical industries
€ 396 million in sales in 2001 Chemicals
Polyester resins (molding and toner) Acrylic resins (hard plastics) € 677 million in sales in 2003
Pharma € 1.4 billion in global sales
Majority of sales are from Zyrtec3
VINCENT DAMIEN Job Titles
1991-Corporate Auditor1993-Management Controller of Pharma
Operations and business groups depend upon IT1996-Responsible for Pharma MIS1997-Responsible for central services
across Belgium HR, IT infrastructure
1998-Administrative and group IT Director2000-Administrative and IT/IS DirectorEnd of 2000- Member of the Senior
management Team
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ISSUES Information technology/information
system (IT/IS)OrganizationRedundancy Inconsistency Inefficiency
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DAMIEN’S IT/IS ORGANIZATION Role of IT/IS:
Information Technology Operations Establish an “efficient, robust, and strong
motorway” of information that would help support business processes, and improve the end users’ productivity.
Information Systems Development Understand business requirements and priorities Develop, implement, maintain, and support IS to
meet these requirements.
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GLOBAL VISION This global vision concerned:
Infrastructure Hardware/softwareCommunication
Created Global IT/IS Standards: To share experience and develop
synergies across the group To reduce heterogeneity, inconsistencies,
and hidden costs To improve communication and cost
effectiveness
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STANDARDS Single email system Standardized hardware and software
systemsOracle for database application Microsoft Office for desktop productivityCompaq desktop PCsNT 4 Operating System
Contract negotiationsGroup Contract IT/IS ManagerGroup vs. each sector; individually
Cost savings of € 2.7 million by 1999
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CHANGES IN IT/IS 1996
IT/IS activities were independently initiated within each sector and location. Inconsistency Redundancy Higher cost
2001Wanted to establish global IT/IS standards
Develop synergy across groupsAll report to Damien
Improve communication across groups Reduce inconsistency
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THE NEW DATA CENTER 1st step in improving operational support system Hub of the UCB global network Upgraded their computers Created a central computer room
Underground 300 servers ran production applications
From all sectors and geographies Back-ups were handled automatically by a new
robot-driven system Server operations and monitoring were
outsourced Several miles away from the nearest UCB facility
Back-up: original computer room10
HELP DESK SUPPORT In 1993, first began
No computersOne person covering the call centerOnly spoke one language
In 1998Six peopleStaff spoke two languages
In 2002Centralized databaseSupported 200 applicationsCall center staff spoke 7-10 languages
High turnover11
IT OPERATIONS Regional Operations
America, Asia, and EuropeReport directly to DamienUse corporate standards when appropriateLocal needs of various business groupsVariations in technology
Global OperationsConcentrated on infrastructure that applied to all
sectors and regions Such as WAN and corporate network standards
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IS DEVELOPMENT Global Development
Developing and delivering technological solutions in use by all sectors and regions, such as PeopleSoft
Sectorial DevelopmentDeveloping and delivering applications for
specific sectors, such as knowledge management for Pharma
Major Is Projects:Knowledge Management3R Portal Project
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KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT Past
60% of all documents were in foreign languages All on paper
Present Now all written in English All critical documents are digital
They have staff dedicated to indexing and translating documents: Notes from physicians Published scientific papers related to drug
development- competitors UCB docs- research analysis and in house
research reports14
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT They had robust security Easy-to-use folder organization for storing
and retrieving their 90,000 documents Pharmaceutical industry
More money was spent on the creation of knowledge than on the equipment used to produce the products developed from that knowledge
Important because pharmaceutics is a knowledge-building process
Laws related to pharmaceutics, which vary by country, require companies to keep documents associated with the drugs for the life of the product plus five years 15
3R PORTAL PROJECT
Designed to provide access to key information through a customizable/personalized Web portal.
Two key layers:Corporate level of information
Everyone in the company had access to the same information
Single user name/password is needed for access to all network applications
Sectorial and functional layer Including site specific information relevant to specific
job responsibilities; individually tailored to the person’s job
Personalized Web portal to deliver appropriate information based on the identity of each person
Access could be denied to inappropriate information16
CONCLUSION Improved and changed IT/IS Now have the foundational building
blocks for a next generation knowledge management system
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QUESTIONS1. What does UCB stand for?
a. United Company of Belgiumb. Universal Company of Belgiumc. University of California, Berkleyd. None of the above
2. Which one was NOT one of the issues UCB faced?a. Inefficiencyb. Organizationc. Redundancyd. None of the above
3. Vincent Damien was….a. the great, great grandson of one of the founders of UCB.b. president of UCB.c. mostly responsible for reorganizing and restructuring
UCB’s IT/IS departments from 1996-2002.d. All of the above
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REFERENCES UCB: Managing Information for
Globalization and Innovation article http://www.ucb.com/about-ucb/ http://www.ucb.com/about-ucb/history http://www.ucb.com/media-room/editori
al-guidelines http://www.ucb.com/rd/
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