6th IT Forum Review 

On September 21, 2010 KPMG in Greece held its 6th IT Forum titled ERP Strategy: Achieving optimum "sail". The event took place at the Pentelikon Hotel with great success, drawing over 150 top IT professionals to its sessions. The event’s keynote speaker was INSEAD Professor Yves Doz, however during the course of the day participants had the chance to watch several other sessions and a panel discussion with top executives from a range of Greek and multinational organizations including KPMG in Greece. Additionally, the results of two related surveys were presented to participants. 

 

Overall, the event served as an excellent opportunity for participants to network, and to compare and share ideas.

In his first session, Professor Yves Doz presented and analyzed the value of ERP implementation for the improvement of the "strategic agility" of enterprises. ERPs improve enterprise agility, by increasing the ability of decision makers to make educated decisions and changes, fast and efficiently. In his second session, the Professor presented a case-study based on Nokia’s use of an ERP system during the 1990’s, which lead to the company’s meteoric rise as one of the most important companies in the mobile phone industry.

 

After the Professor’s first session, Director at KPMG’s IT Advisory, Mr. Bill Demakakos presented the results of two KPMG surveys. The first of these surveys titled “From cost to value: 2010 Global Survey on the CIO Agenda” was conducted by KPMG International. Part of the survey focused on the role of a CIO, and how it has been influenced and changed in recent times. It showed among other things that cost optimization and process improvement are more important nowadays and have become a vital part of an IT strategy. The survey went on to show that CIOs feel optimistic about their future, and that investment in ERPs will grow. Finally, the survey showed that CIOs consider cloud computing and collaborating tools to be very important, and that they may become a “necessity” in the years to come.

The second survey of sector-wide focus was based on the Greek market, including a vast array of out-of the box and in-house ERP solutions. The survey showed that IT practitioners were highly satisfied with the ERP implementation projects that they had undertaken in Greece. Finally, a trend for ERP expansion was identified through the survey.

 

During the day’s panel discussion participants from the top ERP vendors on the Greek market discussed the definition and scope of an ERP system, as well as the usual problems encountered in an ERP development project, such as customizations, and resistance to change. During the discussion each participant was also able to present his company’s strategy around ERP systems in the future.

Participants of the panel discussion were:

  • Panos Gikas - Microsoft Dynamics Lead, Microsoft Hellas
  • Antonis Monokrousos - Managing Director Oracle Greece & Cluster Leader Greece, Cyprus, Malta, Albania, FYR of Macedonia, Kosovo
  • Manos Raptopoulos - Chairman and Managing Director for SAP Hellas and Cyprus

 

The moderator of the discussion was Mr. Virgil Touineas, Partner, IT Advisory at KPMG

The last session of the day was taken up by four presentations by IT practitioners who presented their own experiences with ERP implementation in their companies. The session titled "Using ERPs to boost enterprise value", focused on real-life examples on ERP implementation and use, in order to boost companies’ value.
Presenters during this last session were:

  • Anastasios Danas, Group IT Director, Hellenic Petroleum
  • Aris Kavalos, IT Director, Verbund APT Energa Hellas
  • Cenk Kiral, Regional Director of BI & EPM solutions, Oracle
  • Panagiotis Mariolis, Research & Project Director, Τoyota Material Handling

Presentations

Please go to the event presentations page to login and view the event presentations.