The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is considering whether to make fundamental changes to how carriers (and ultimately their customers) pay for federal programs that provide greater access to telecommunications and Internet services. The dilemma facing the FCC is that Universal Service Fund (USF) program expenses are increasing, while interstate and…
I recently attended the UK Society for Computers and Law’s Annual Conference where Cloud Computing was one of the ‘IT Law Hot Topics’ under discussion. The others, in case you are interested, were Big Data, Apps and Mobile Payments. The event was sold out which goes to show how ‘hot’…
Sitting in the Northeast, our news has been dominated by only two stories for the last week–Hurricane Sandy and the Presidential Election. Both events have far reaching impacts on this country and its citizens, and both have (or could have) significant impacts on our industry. Sandy . . . Hurricane…
There has been much brouhaha throughout the 2012 presidential debates about the loss of American jobs through outsourcing to lower-cost countries. China has been portrayed as the evil nation stealing jobs and intellectual property, and violating trade rules. However, outsourcing doesn’t necessarily mean the loss of jobs to other countries.…
In negotiating outsourcing agreements, I sit on both sides of the table – obviously not at the same time. I represent customers about half of my time, and I spend the rest of the time representing suppliers. It’s always interesting seeing a transaction from one particular viewpoint, but also knowing…
As noted in our previous blog posting on the subject, the most prevalent model for pricing applications outsourcing services involves the following components: (1) a fixed monthly charge for applications maintenance; (2) a fixed monthly charge for a baseline number of application enhancements hours (typically included as part of the…
In April, we wrote about what we were seeing in the cloud space, including the impact of cloud computing on the CIO agenda. Since then, Savvis published an independent survey of 550 CIOs and Senior IT personnel from large global enterprises concerning their IT outsourcing strategies, including those around cloud…
It has been six weeks since the SEC issued final rules relating to the reporting of conflict minerals. The rules apply to public companies that are subject to reporting requirements under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (so-called “issuers”). Issuers must report on the use of conflict minerals in their…
Historically, outsourcing agreements included terms typically lasting five to seven years or even longer – with additional years tacked on as options exercisable only by the customer. But several factors suggest that a customer should think twice and at least consider shorter term deals with its service providers: The Deteriorating…
The pricing structure of outsourcing transactions often reflects a balancing of competing objectives. In the case of applications outsourcing services, most customers want the pricing structure to provide predictability and proper financial incentives for the supplier to continually increase productivity and efficiency in service delivery. At the same time, both…