Steven Zolman

Jul. 19,2011

Clients dealing with complex issues generally understand there is no such thing as “Too Much Information”.  Our world’s information is currently doubling every two years, and in 2010 alone, we created more information than in all of recorded history.  This ongoing data explosion inundates all our clients, but can also be an enormous opportunity.  NET(net) specializes in IT Investment Optimization, an area where the information is convoluted, the answers are obfuscated, and the rules are unintelligible.  In our world of supplier marketing presentations, supplier pricing models, supplier support policies, and supplier contract provisions and agreements, the information is convoluted, the answers are obfuscated, and the rules are unintelligible – creating an immense opportunity to help clients navigate these issues to improve performance.

For an example, take a simple product like Microsoft Office.  How many ways do you think you can license this product?  It may surprise you to learn that instead of a few simple options, there are actually over 3,000 different published ways to license this technology.  What’s worse is that once you factor in all your variable inputs like business requirements, ownership position, organizational need, access requirements, infrastructure standards, technology roadmaps, existing consumption, planned usage, delivery requirements, etc. – the  economic delta between way number 1 and way number 3,000 is an astounding 9,225.6%.  That means client number 1 could pay $100k for the same technology for which client number 3,000 pays $9.2M.  Clearly, there is a lot of opportunity to improve performance, and understanding the massive amounts of information and variables is a key component of making good business decisions.

As we see time and again, there is just no way for our clients to keep pace with the raw amount of growing and changing information that is available to them.  What’s worse is that information that is unknown is the primary reason why our clients suffer from sub-optimized investments.  Other factors of sub-optimization include changes in market conditions, supplier policy changes, and activated contractual terms and conditions.  In a modern economy, information is and should be the prime asset--the raw material of new products and services, smarter business decisions, competitive advantages for companies, and greater growth opportunities and productivity improvements.

NET(net)’s ability to federate market intelligence across multiple clients, across multiple suppliers, across multiple industries, and across multiple geographies has resulted in an extensive proprietary database of the world’s best deals, enabling us to help clients quickly benchmark their spend and their contracts to determine if optimization potential exists to improve economic and/or strategic value.  If optimization potential is discovered, NET(net) offers extensive optimization expertise to help Clients structure better deals, resulting in improved economics and more strategic value.  If supplier negotiations are required, NET(net) offers experienced negotiators to help clients secure the non-standard concessions they seek to make their investments and relationships more  sustainable.

After the deal is done, NET(net) also offers implementation project management oversight to ensure the new supply structure is implemented and functional.  Further, NET(net) offers ongoing contract and supplier management services to help clients ensure that they keep the value they found through the advisory phase, and the value they got through the optimization and negotiation phase.

These attributes help us "Bring Clarity out of Chaos", better enabling our clients to improve economic and strategic value from their supply chain.  With these economic and strategic improvements, our clients improve the value of their organization.

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