Satyam frames IT outsourcing model with CMU

Satyam Computer Services (SCS), an end-to-end IT solutions company, has partnered with US-based Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) to develop the eServices Capability Model (escm). This model guides IT-enabled outsourcing service providers to appraise and improve their capability to provide consistently high-quality services in the networked economy. 

Satyam is also a founding partner in the new Information Technology Services Qualification Center (ITsqc) set up in the CMU campus. Satyam will be the first company authorized to use escm for its clients in India and around the world.

Accenture, a management and technology consulting organization and provider of outsourcing services, also has joined the effort, providing funds and placing some of its associate partners at Carnegie Mellon as visiting industrial scholars. They also will assist in developing the outsourcing evaluation methodologies.

escm provides IT-enabled outsourcing service providers with a set of practices that enable them to effectively manage outsourcing relationships by focusing on the critical organizational attributes for people, technology and knowledge and their applicability in the outsourcing process. To support the various forms of usage envisaged, escm will be accompanied by multiple appraisal and evaluation methods. These will enable providers to determine their current capabilities to establish and maintain outsourcing relationships and deliver services to their clients. The appraisal methods will also enable clients to consistently compare multiple potential providers.

"Over the past several years, a broad spectrum of organizations-- from manufacturing firms to banks to hospitals-- have been delegating IT-intensive activities to external service providers. Often the sophistication of what they need far outstrips the level of competence they have and it's more cost-effective to outsource. But in many cases, they have not been satisfied with the results", said Jane Siegel, Director ITSQC and a senior scientist in CMU's SCS International Institute for Software Research.