PTT aims for IT on tap
With an aim to strengthen ICT resources among companies in the group, the PTT conglomerate has established a new company named PTT ICT Solutions to provide intra-group information and communication-technology services.
The move is not only to reduce IT department duplications but also to increase the company's profit capability. The new company with Bt150 million registered capital is shared equally at 20 per cent by the main five companies - PTT Plc, PTT Exploration and Production Plc, PTT Chemical Plc, Thai Oil Plc and Aromatic (Thailand) Plc. Chaicharearn Atibaedya, managing director of PTT ICT Solutions, said the new company was set up with a hope to consolidate IT spending among PTT's subsidiaries so that when it came to buying IT products and services, it would make the whole group cost-efficient. It would also help the group better utilise IT resources. Normally, each subsidiary in the group buys its own IT products separately. Chaicharearn said the new company, which consolidated IT resources and spending, would help the group save costs. "With this new policy, we will collect orders from all subsidiaries when they want to buy the same products to create a bigger volume so we have more bargaining power. We can then ask vendors to offer us products at a much lower price," he said. As the new company also acts as a profit centre, he said, it would also provide the subsidiaries with hardware and software design, system design, infrastructure networks, communication and data centre services as well as a data cleaning management service - with a charge. He said the company hoped to gain about Bt1 billion of the budget in the first year, the same as the group's total IT budget. Apart from providing IT services internally, the company also acts as a vendor providing ICT management products for companies outside the group. "Our priority is to provide IT consultancy services to PTT companies but we also provide some services and software to a few state enterprise customers," said Chaicharearn. In the next three years, he added that the company would expand business to provide services to more companies. At present, revenue is poured into the conglomerate from outside. "For the first three years, we use the 'Cost Plus' concept, which means the majority of PTT ICT Solutions' revenue comes from the PTT group. Later, we will generate more revenue from outside," said Chaocharearn.
Asina Pornwasin The Nation
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