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Technology Stocks : Discuss Year 2000 Issues -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ruyi who wrote (2628)	9/28/1998 11:30:00 AM
From: RagTimeBand	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 9818

From the Systems & Peripherals section of the September 7, 1998 issue of Computer Reseller News: Sidebar Y2K SPLIT PERSONALITIES -- Managers are of two minds when it come to year 2000 readiness: - 65 percent say fixing the distributed Y2K desktop problem is critically important to their organizations. - 91 percent say Y2K compliance issues are receiving the highest attention possible within their organizations. - 90 percent plan to have all of their enterprise applications compliant before the new millennium. HOWEVER - 30 percent do no conduct hardware and software inventories of their assets - 65 percent have not yet calculated the cost of correcting errant desktops. - 30 percent have not yet secured the required labor necessary to address their Y2K effort. - 71 percent have not yet developed a compliance plan that defines which desktops need to be fixed and in what order. * Base: 449 top-level managers in Fortune 1000 companies * Source: Cameron School of Business, University of North Carolina at Wilmington, with Chris Jesse, President and CEO of Tangram Enterprise Solutions Main story: Despite The Rhetoric, Companies Slow To Ensure PC's Year 2000 Compliance * Fundamental Problem: Using out-of-date asset information By Jennifer Hagendorf Cary, N.C. The results of a new survey on desktop year 2000 compliance efforts show that actions, or lack thereof, speak louder than words. The survey, conducted by the University of North Carolina at Wilmington and Chris Jesse, president and chief executive of Cary-based Tangram Enterprise Solutions Inc., revealed that through companies say they recognize desktop Y2K compliance as critical, many are not prepared to fix the problem. Out of 449 Fortune 1000 top-level managers, 65 percent said fixing the distributed Y2K desktop problem is critically important, 91 percent said Y2K-compliance issues are receiving the highest attention possible and 90 percent said they plan to have all of their enterprise applications compliant before the new millennium. However, the study also revealed many companies are not taking steps to ensure compliance goals will be met on time, said Jesse. "We've discovered a fundamental problem: Most organizations are addressing desktop compliance efforts with asset information that's at least a year old or, worse they have no asset information at all," said Jesse. The study showed that 30 percent of respondents do not conduct hardware and software inventories of their assets while 64 percent of those who do so conduct them only once a year or less frequently. "This is the first hint we see here of a major difference between planning and ability to execute," Jesse said. For resellers, the survey results indicate that over the next year, VARs will find that discretionary spending in all aspects of computer acquisitions -- be they desktop refresh or new software programs -- is going to dry up as funds are diverted to compliance efforts, said Jesse. "Resellers that have a Y2K initiative . . . will be the ones that come out on top over the next 12 months, and those that have no meaningful initiative in this area will be the ones that will find their revenues, their earnings and their stock price dipping," he said. Other disturbing survey results showed 65 percent of respondents have not yet calculated the cost of correcting errant desktops, and of those that have, 40 percent do not include the cost of memory upgrades, harddisk upgrades and labor as part of their budget, said Jesse. The labor cost of upgrading non-compliant desktops is going to be one of the largest hidden expenses in year 2000 efforts, he said. "I think the results of the survey are even a little too optimistic," said Stephanie Moore, senior research analyst with Giga Information Group Inc., Cambridge, Mass. The survey showed 31 percent of respondents have not yet compiled a list of non-compliant applications, but, based on her own client base, Moore estimated the percentage is likely closer to 60 percent industrywide. The survey also indicated that 71 percent of the respondents have not yet developed a compliance plan that defines which desktops need to be fixed and in what order, while 30 percent have not yet secured the labor required to implement their year 2000-compliance effort. "Very few organizations are factoring the costs of the desktop renovations at all into their overall estimates of what the year 2000 is going to cost them," said Moore. Companies that underestimate year 2000 costs will be in trouble when analysis of their financial disclosures reveals they actually do not have a firm understanding of compliance issues, she said.