Carphone Warehousehas signed a
five-yearoutsourcing dealworth at least £100m
withIndian-based IT services company
Patni.
The deal gives the mobile phone retailer the flexibility and
responsiveness it needs to shift from selling mobile phones to
earning more from telecoms services, said CTO Simon Post.
Carphone Warehouse will also licence Patni to resell to new
virtual network operators a
customer relationship management (CRM), billing and
provisioning package that is effectively a "telco in a box", Post
said.
He said the decision to outsource and offshore left Carphone
Warehouse free to respond to the needs of the business. "Things
happen so fast here that a three-year IT strategy is out of the
question," Post said.
"We concentrate on building an infrastructure that helps the
business respond flexibly and quickly."
Post said the deal cemented a "four or five-year ad hoc
relationship" with Patni. Patni helped to develop Carphone
Warehouse's CRM billing system, and looks after several of the
retailer's legacy systems that cover insurance and other business
lines.
Carphone Warehouse is also likely to work with Patni to
redevelop its customised electronic point of sale system, said
Post. This currently runs on Digital Alpha technology under VMS and
serves more than 2,100 stores in 11 countries.