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Thursday, January 21, 2010
Today's News Headlines
* Latin American demand shifting towards integrated solutions - HP - Regional
* Half of Banco Galicia's US$53mn investments to go to IT in 2010 - Argentina
* Anticipating demand: Providing solutions for OECD regulations - Chile
* IBM sees Q4 Americas revenue slide 3% - Regional
* Roundup: SAP, ICT trade mission, Digitron-Gigabyte, CorpFlex-Essence - Regional
* GlobalCollect opens Buenos Aires office to target Latin America - Argentina, Regional
* Quintec inks CRM alliance with CMetrix - Chile
* Portable computers accounting for 55% of overall PC sales - Mexico
* IT investments by large enterprises seen rebounding - report - Brazil
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* Latin American demand shifting towards integrated solutions - HP - Regional
Latin American companies are increasingly seeking integrated IT solutions, HP's (NYSE: HPQ) industry standard servers director for multi-country Latin America, Ramón van Zanten, told BNamericas.
"Market requests to simplify product offerings are a clear macro-tendency," he said.
Earlier this month, HP and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) announced a global solution integration agreement worth US$250mn. The accord covers a range of products from hardware to business applications, as well as management, training and implementation.
The full line of integrated products will be made available during the course of this year.
Van Zenten was unable to disclose the percentage of the overall investment that will be channeled to Latin America, but noted that as part of the agreement, HP and Microsoft will jointly increase their Latin American channel investments ten-fold.
Both Latin American SMEs and large enterprises are expected to respond positively to the agreement, due in part to the relatively high integration costs they face, van Zenten said.
"Consulting is expensive, and I would say that the availability of talent sometimes is not as high as we would like it to be in our region," he said.
The industries that will benefit the most are those that rely most heavily on business and market intelligence, such as the retail, financial and service sectors. Within HP's multi-country Latin America, which includes the entire region except for Mexico and Brazil, demand is expected to be strongest in larger economies such as Argentina, Colombia and Chile.
"In those countries, people are looking for optimization more frequently than in other geographies," van Zenten said.
The executive added that he expects product integration deals to become the norm in the global IT industry, pointing to a recent agreement between Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO), California-based virtualization software company VMware and US storage solutions supplier EMC (NYSE: EMC).
By Matthew Malinowski
Business News Americas
* Half of Banco Galicia's US$53mn investments to go to IT in 2010 - Argentina
Argentina's Banco Galicia plans to invest 200mn pesos (US$53mn) in 2010, with half going to IT systems and the other half to revamp existing branches, install new ATMs and refurbish corporate buildings, Pablo Firvida, IR manager of the bank's parent group Grupo Financiero Galicia (NasdaqCM: GGAL), told BNamericas.
Banco Galicia - one of Argentina's three top private banks - operates through 327 branches and 670 ATMs today.
Firvida said the bank expects to grow both private sector lending and deposits between 20-25% in 2010.
Among the bank's main challenges for this year, the executive named increasing financial intermediation with the private sector, reducing public sector assets with low returns as well as the bank's debt in US dollars and creating synergies with consumer finance company Compañía Financiera Argentina (CFA), which it acquired last June.
Back then, troubled US insurer AIG (NYSE: AIG) agreed to sell 80% of its shares in CFA to Banco Galicia for 133mn pesos. Firvida said the deal complements its already existing credit card business, Tarjetas Regionales.
"While the bank always analyzes M&A opportunities, the purchase of CFA and its takeover - which is still awaiting approval by the central bank - will be a priority this year," he said.
Firvida also said the bank will likely not need to issue bonds in 2010, although Tarjetas Regionales or CFA may do so, either in pesos or in US dollars.
Banco Galicia had 27.4bn pesos in assets and 2.01bn pesos in equity as of end-September.
By Jorge Porter
Business News Americas
* Anticipating demand: Providing solutions for OECD regulations - Chile
On January 11 Chile signed an accession agreement to become the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) 31st member, and while the agreement still requires ratification by congress, many companies in the newly accepted member country have little idea of what the accord means for them.
One of the goals behind the OECD is to level the playing field internationally for companies by working to eliminate bribery and other illicit activity. In Chile, this means that corporations would now take on legal responsibilities for that which happens within their companies, whereas before there was no legal standing to declare an entity guilty.
In response, Chilean IT security solutions provider Neosecure joined with consultancy MPScompliance and law firm Cariola Diez Pérez-Cotapos to provide firms a crime prevention model. BNamericas spoke with Fernando Fuentes, R&D manager for the IT firm, to find out more on Neosecure's role in the partnership.
BNamericas: What exactly does Neosecure bring to the crime prevention model you're offering for corporations to abide by OECD requirements?
Fuentes: The others will cover corporate governance and knowledge of legal risk, and we'll be responsible for the prevention model, which has to do with procedures, responsibilities and other issues. It requires a mechanism that ensures the company is doing what it has to in order to avoid problems with bribery or other legally questionable practices.
To give you an example, when it comes to money laundering, this affects free competition, where someone within a bank can collude with a third party - that third party could be a terrorist or a drug trafficker. There are technological platforms that allow you, via observing transactions, to detect when money laundering takes place.
Another example is, if you have a SAP system that handles all of the acquisitions, today there are many elements that allow you to detect when an acquisition may be irregular. If an employee wants to pay a favor, he enters a supplier [into the SAP system], assigns a certain amount to that account and then makes the supplier disappear. You can observe that... which is produced via systems, and look for irregular activity, raising alerts early on and discover that this conduct is going on.
At the same time, if you have these mechanisms that can detect these types of things, you can show that you're taking the precautions to meet [OECD regulations].
BNamericas: Does this represent a new branch of business for you, or is it an adjustment to a product that is already available?
Fuentes: We've been working on other regulatory structures which have to do with information security: PCI SSC for the credit card industry, Sarbanes Oxley, Basilea. One could put it all under the area of regulation, but this is the first time where we're working with penal risk, so in that aspect it's a first for us.
BNamericas: Have you had any interest on behalf of Chilean corporations, or is it still too early to talk about specific expectations for this product?
Fuentes: It's relatively early to talk about expectations, but it's clear to us that the country has to advance in this material and there's interest in the market. Some companies are going through the educational phase right now, [learning about] the impact that not complying with the rules and managing risk could have on their organizations.
By Christian Molinari
Business News Americas
* IBM sees Q4 Americas revenue slide 3% - Regional
IBM (NYSE: IBM) saw its Americas division revenues slip 3% to US$11.1bn during the fourth quarter, the company said in a statement.
The Americas region includes the US, Canada and all of Latin America.
IBM chief financial officer Mark Loughridge said during a conference call that the company saw "mid to high single digit" growth in Brazil, as well as in other emerging markets such as China and India.
Global fourth quarter revenues crept up 1% to US$27.2bn.
Technology services revenues increased 4.4% to US$10.1bn and software sales increased 2.4% to US$6.58bn. On the other hand, systems and technology sales declined 4.3% to US$5.19bn.
Net income increased 4% to US$4.8bn, with the bottom line helped by a 5% decline in expenses.
Meanwhile, yearlong Americas division sales decreased 6% to US$40.2bn. Global revenues fell 8% to US$95.8bn, while net profits increased 9% to US$13.4bn.
IBM expects earnings per share of US$11 in 2010. No other financial projections were given.
By Business News Americas staff reporters
* Roundup: SAP, ICT trade mission, Digitron-Gigabyte, CorpFlex-Essence - Regional
The Latin American division of SAP (NYSE: SAP) has tapped Felix Feddersen as senior vice president for large enterprises, the company said in a statement.
Feddersen has nearly two decades of IT industry experience, having previously served as HP's (NYSE: HPQ) Latin American sales vice president for the technology solutions group.
The executive has degrees from Brazil's Universidade Federal de Rio Grande do Sul and the University of Virginia.
***
Representatives from Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic and Canada have plans to carry out an ICT trade mission, Costa Rica's IT chamber Camtic said in a statement.
The mission will be held in Costa Rica on February 11-12. Canadian companies participating in the event include Interfacing, Mentum, Netromedia, Plex Digital Fabric IC, Vecima Networks INC and VisionMAX.
***
Brazilian computer components manufacturer Digitron has discontinued the local production of motherboards for Taiwanese PC firm Gigabyte, online news source IT Web reported.
Digitron ended the alliance, which was formed in 2007, due to incompatibility with company polices, the report said.
***
Brazilian IT infrastructure supplier CorpFlex has inked a partnership with local IT consultancy Essence, the companies said in a statement.
Under the terms of the agreement, both companies will mesh their ERP and outsourcing offers, which will include software as a service (SaaS), infrastructure as a service (IaaS) and platforms as a service (PaaS).
By Business News Americas staff reporters
* GlobalCollect opens Buenos Aires office to target Latin America - Argentina, Regional
Dutch payment services provider GlobalCollect has opened an office in Argentina's capital Buenos Aires to serve the Latin American region, the company said in a statement.
The move will "spread our service portfolio and commercial footprint to accommodate an increased focus by merchants to develop their e-commerce business in this fast growing region," company CEO Jan Manten said.
The company's interface platform WebCollect is able to process transactions in Spanish and Portuguese, and contracts with local acquirers such as Barcode Santander in Chile, Pago Fácil in Argentina, and Boleto Bancário in Brazil.
GlobalCollect is a payment service provider of local e-payment solutions for international customer not-present (CNP) channels such as internet, mail and telephone orders. The company focuses on a wide range of industries such as travel, ticketing, telecommunications, retail, publishing, portals, online gaming and digital content.
By Business News Americas staff reporters
* Quintec inks CRM alliance with CMetrix - Chile
Chilean tech holding company Quintec has formed a partnership with local IT consultancy CMetrix, the companies said in a joint statement.
According to the agreement, Quintec and CMetrix will offer an on-demand CRM solution dubbed CRM Live, which will be based on Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Dynamics CRM. Quintec will provide its collaboration and hosted messaging platforms, while CMetrix, which specializes in CRM and collaboration solutions, will carry out implementations.
Quintec's commercial manager for computing solutions, Maurizio Rinaldi, said the agreement will complement his company's growing software as a service (SaaS) offering.
Oracle's (Nasdaq: ORCL) application sale representative for Chile, Darío Medrano, recently told BNamericas that large enterprises in Latin America are showing interest in hybrid versions of his company's on-demand CRM solution.
Solutions such as CRM offered through the SaaS model have traditionally appealed to smaller firms with less technological resources.
Still, Medrano said that trend is changing in Latin America, as larger companies are adopting hybrid CRM with on-demand solutions mixed with traditional licenses.
By Business News Americas staff reporters
* Portable computers accounting for 55% of overall PC sales - Mexico
Portable computers represented nearly 55% of Mexico's overall PC sales last year, according to a study published by local ICT consultancy Select.
Laptops accounted for 46.7% of overall sales, up from 45% in 2008. Netbooks represented 7.5% of sales, in comparison to 2.2% the year-prior.
Meanwhile, desktops accounted for 45.8% of market revenues, down from 52.8% in 2008.
Select analyst Emilio Parra attributed the increasing portable PC share to shrinking price differences, with the average laptop costing US$907, while desktops and netbooks come in at US$672 and US$412, respectively.
Meanwhile, in 2001 the average desktop cost US$983mn, in comparison to US$1,681 for a laptop.
"The PC market has shown a shift towards mobility, and this trend has strengthened in the last 10 years," the report said.
Mexico's overall PC market pulled in US$2.95bn through September 2009, in comparison to the US$3.96bn recorded in the first three quarters of 2008.
By Business News Americas staff reporters
* IT investments by large enterprises seen rebounding - report - Brazil
Some of Brazil's largest companies are expected to increase IT expenditures 10-15% this year, returning budgets to pre-crisis levels, according to a report in local newspaper Valor Econômico.
The findings were based on a survey of executives from Petrobras (NYSE: PBR), Votorantim, Ambev, Bradesco (NYSE: BBD), Itaú Unibanco (NYSE: ITUB), Banco do Brasil (BB), Braskem (NYSE: BAK), Comgás, Klabin and Correios.
Itaú Unibanco said it will earmark 3.3bn reais (US$1.85bn) to its IT budget, while Bradesco, Banco do Brasil and Correios will channel 3bn reais, 1.4bn reais and 120mn reais, respectively.
Correios said it will focus on renovating its databases and PCs, while Petrobras reported that virtualization will be a top IT investment priority this year, with the company hoping to have 55% of its computers virtualized by year's end.
Brazil's electronic goods association Abinee previously reported that the domestic IT industry will grow 12% this year, reaching 39.5bn reais.
By Business News Americas staff reporters
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In-deph interview
* Software exports to continue expanding despite crisis
Alvaro Lamé
President
Cámara Uruguaya de Tecnologías de la Información (Cuti)
Uruguay
http://www.bnamericas.com/interviews/technology/Alvaro_Lame_,Camara_Uruguaya_de_Tecnologias_de_la_Informacion_,Cuti,,/170884291
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Main companies covered in today's news
* Associação Brasileira de Bancos
http://www.bnamericas.com/company-profile/en/Associacao_Brasileira_de_Bancos-ABBC/170884291
* Intel Corp.
http://www.bnamericas.com/company-profile/en/Intel_Corp,-Intel/170884291
* Microsoft Corporation
http://www.bnamericas.com/company-profile/en/Microsoft_Corporation-Microsoft/170884291
* Orange Business Services
http://www.bnamericas.com/company-profile/en/Orange_Business_Services-OBS/170884291
* 3Com Corporation
http://www.bnamericas.com/company-profile/en/3Com_Corporation-3Com/170884291
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