ICL overhauls its outsourcing arm

Customer communication problems lead vendor to rejig its CFM division

ICL is implementing a massive restructure for its outsourcing division to resolve the problems that customers faced following the merger with CFM six months ago.

In January, the merger of ICL and CFM outsourcing divisions ? now called ICL CFM ? left the manufacturer with internal communications problems, and customers with a variety of contact points.

But as part of the restructure, each customer will have one account manager responsible for its business.

The distributed services group has now been unified into one team of 1,500 people, and professional services, dealing with the year 2000 problem, has been expanded to 450 staff.

With a sales and marketing team of 50 and increased advertising, ICL hopes to raise its profile in Europe by initially gaining contracts from branches of UK-based companies and then from US companies, using the UK as a springboard into Europe.

Customer support will also become one unit under the restructure, with separate centres being established as required. The division will provide a multinational voice and data network for Western Europe and will go worldwide some time next year.

A representative at ICL said the changes will allow the company to be considered seriously for contracts above #50 million and to increase business in Europe. He also said the company was looking to hire 300 additional people by the end of the year.

Management structures in the distributed services division will remain unchanged, with David Smith continuing as director of distributed services.

ICL CFM manages 8,000 servers and 300,000 PCs. It is ranked as the number three outsourcer in the UK.