Quelle: CIO, Asia

Since their emergence four years ago, portals have become a key component of the corporate IT infrastructure. They are no longer just presentation layers for access to business applications, but are frameworks to enable composite applications as well as mechanisms for integration, content and collaboration services. Portal capabilities have become so valuable they are being built into enterprise software such as ERPERP, CRMCRM and e-procurement. Alles zu CRM auf CIO.de Alles zu ERP auf CIO.de

As a result companies are not only using portals as tactical tools for managing enterprise applications, but deploying them to support strategic business initiatives. A portal helps Newmont Indonesia, the Indonesian subsidiary of the world's largest gold mining company, Newmont Worldwide Group, increase revenue through improved asset utilisation, and lower inventory costs through just-in-time warehousing. A portal enables Novell Asia Pacific to get more use out of its enterprise systems by hiding their complexity from users. The importance companies are placing on portals is reflected in CIOs' spending decisions. According to Frost & Sullivan, portal sales in the Asia Pacific stood at US $73.3 million in 2002, an 18 percent growth rate above 2001, and is expected to grow to US $108.6 million by the end of 2006.

Portals bridge legacy information

"We have modern day applications such as Windows Office XP, as well as legacy applications. What we needed to do was to give users at our operations all over Indonesia, including mobile users located within the mine, access to any of these applications quickly, making information access as simple as a phone call," says Rohit Diesh, manager, Information Services, for the Indonesian subsidiaries of U.S.-based Newmont Worldwide Group, the world's largest gold mining company. Its subsidiaries in Indonesia include PT Newmont Pacific Nusantara, PTNewmont Minahassa Raya, PT Newmont Horus Nauli and PT Newmont NusaTenggara.

Newmont Indonesia operates gold and copper mines on the Indonesian islands of Sulawesi (1,500 miles northeast of Jakarta) and Sumbawa(950 miles east of Jakarta) - far flung and remote areas with a lack of IT expertise, making the job of giving users access to the data they need, even more challenging. Besides these two mines, it also has an office in the city of Jakarta, as well as on the islands of Lombok and Sumatra. Its primary data centre is situated at the Batu Hajau site on Sumbawa.

Diesh, like a growing number of CIOs in the Asia Pacific, turned to portals to support his company's information strategy and create a competitive advantage for it. Portal and application delivery software - Citrix MetraFrame XP - is helping him to solve his challenge of extending business applications to users in six geographically dispersed locations across Indonesia, and it is doing that with the least cost and pain. With portal technology, all Diesh's users need is a browser to log on and launch full client-server applications. Its key mission-critical applications include a MIMS ERP system (from Australian software house Mincom Ltd), a Novell GroupWise e-mail system and MicrosoftMicrosoft XP office suite. Besides MIMS, senior executives can also access other legacy applications such as a cash management system from Citibank, and also have access to reporting tools from Brio Software, Inc. Alles zu Microsoft auf CIO.de