Merry Christmas to all:

- il y a 10 ans… les pentaloguiens français découvraient notre siège détruit par la tempête pendant qu’Aymeric, Eric et moi ouvrions Brasov
- @danavram elle va mieux ?
- bcp de mauvais souvenirs, http://www.pentablog.fr/pour-les-amis/je-prends-5-minutes-de-plus-pour-vous-dire/#comments
- la premiere version de la monographie 2009 de Pentalog: http://bit.ly/4O2yxs
- la derniere revue de presse qu’on diffuse cette annee: http://bit.ly/5YEqEH

- 10 Outsourcing Trends to Watch in 2010 (17 December 2009, Outsourcing Russia)
- 6 Offshore Outsourcing Hot Spots for 2010 (22 December 2009, CIO)
- Tunisian economy resists world financial and economic crisis (26 December 2009, Tunis-Afrique Presse)
- India helps Mongolia in IT outsourcing (28 December 2009, CIOL)
- Five big questions about cloud computing (22 December 2009, InfoWorld)
- Today Linux is no more an option, it is a necessity (24 December 2009, CIOL)
- The top underreported tech stories of 2009 (28 December 2009, InfoWorld)
- IT-Krise war gar nicht so schlimm (22 December 2009, Netzeitung)
- Datensicherheit, Nutzen, Offhoring: Outsourcing-Projekte in Deutschland (22 December 2009, CIO)
- Deutsche und Inder forschen zusammen (23 December 2009, Silicon)
- Offshoring soll wachsen: Die Outsourcing-Trends 2010 (23 December 2009, CIO)
- Ausblick 2010: neue Chancen und Aufgaben der IT (28 December 2009, ZDNet)

…10 years ago, while moving Pentalog into Romania, our headquarters in Orleans was completely destroyed by one of the worst storms ever seen in France. Everything was pulverized, wiped out… but our servers were still functional. I would like to thank all those who, that December 26, rallied to save the company. And it was not easy… It was in these terrible moments that Pentalog was born in Romania. A few weeks before, we increased the capital to fund this new adventure. December 26 we were virtually ruined… but we were the modern adventurers of our time and we found the inspiration to continue the adventure…

… Aymeric, Eric and I were preparing to spend Christmas with a charming family in Brasov, far from our own families. It was very cold and we were just starting our Romanian adventure. This led us to become one of the most powerful software companies in Romania. Some of the people who participated with us in those glorious days are still with us. I am bowing to them.

As vrea sa va transmit tuturor Craciun fericit alaturi de cei dragi, si un gand special pentru prietenii mei romani pe care nu i-am vazut de multa vreme.

To all others, I care for you, but I know Aymeric, Eric and I have a special thought for Romania tonight and especially for the family who welcomed us with such generosity 10 years ago.

Here is the Christmas PentaMac:

- Manager Assistant (RSIB407): Descrierea postului : In cadrul Serviciului Administrativ Financiar (SAF) al Pentalog… http://bit.ly/6i1VhF
- Pentalog_de Outsourcing bargain hunting – how to get a great deal http://bit.ly/7fJkrF
- ISO 9001-2008 : Audit de surveillance AFNOR réussi: http://bit.ly/6esRas
- business trips follow up – Israel: one MOU sended for the creation of a local sales subsidiary – NL: potential partnership on tracks
- New office opened in Hanoi. Doubling…I saw pictures You have to wait a bit.
- Programator PHP (RIAS408): Descrierea postului : Pentalog Iasi cauta programatori PHP, pentru un nou proiect care s… http://bit.ly/8tpBXB
- Volvo will become Chinese and Saab is about to die… World is changing deeply even in the North Social Paradise.
- Programator Flex (RRO411): Descrierea postului : Clientul nostru furnizeaza harti detaliate, driving directions si … http://bit.ly/54ziuV
- iPhone Apple Software Developer (RRO410): Descrierea postului : Clientul nostru furnizeaza harti detaliate, driving… http://bit.ly/8A5idF
- Programator C++ (RRO409): Descrierea postului : Clientul nostru furnizeaza harti detaliate, driving directions si r… http://bit.ly/54zOcE

We have just finished moving our Hanoi branch office into their new premises. Having reached our initial objectives, it was necessary to acquire a larger production site in order to allow for future growth. This new office is located 200m from our previous location.

Moving branch offices is always critical. We must lose the minimum in production downtime and maintain the same level of efficiency as at the previous office. The established process has already proven successful over the past 15 months: 3 branch offices have more than doubled the production area each time, with an increased workforce of more than 200 people in total. The Iasi branch will once again move in January. It’s always a competition for the branch manager and IT department to keep the delay between the decision making process and the move as short as possible. Presently the delay is on an average 3 months (including finding new premises). The professionalism of this process is essential to ensure a good result: a new operational office, Monday morning after having “stopped” on Friday afternoon.

On Friday, all activity stops so that everyone can start gathering their things and putting them into boxes. The infrastructure team dismantles the network elements to be re-established immediately in the new offices. The internet access for our business is the most critical element after electrical power (which is validated when choosing the new premises). This validation always precedes moving. This was done Friday night with the remote intervention of the IT team in Europe. The move would then continue the following day.

With the short distance between the two offices, we decided to make this move in the “Vietnamese” manner. We therefore called on 20 people (50% less than a truck) to move all our furniture, chairs and other things. It was the IT team who took care of loading the car and moving our equipment. The move proceeded smoothly, without any hitches, and without any surprises. Saturday evening, all the furniture was in place, the machines were checked.

Sunday was spent completing all the finishing touches: telephones, cleaning, storage of personal belongings, mounting the dedicated hardware for customer service in our server room (expanded to support the VOD project test materials). The new branch offices was now ready for Monday morning to start production as if the premises has not changed. This new office still has an area of approximately 200m ² to be fitted out.

Of course, the success of this new move would not have been possible without the preparations of Tuan (branch office Director) and Tanguy (IT) with the help of Thinh (recently recruited). Also, I cannot forget to thank the girls (Tinh Hai, Kim-Anh, Nhung) who helped put the finishing touches on the offices.

In the coming days, Tuan will make a video presentation of his new branch office. Let me give you just a quick overview of the new premises.

January 08, it will be the turn for the Iasi branch to move, and Greg is almost ready to start the move into the new facilities. The success of this move is unavoidable!

- What CIOs Get Wrong About Emerging Technology (18 December 2009, CIO)
- Sun Microsystems unveils advanced cloud security tools (18 December 2009, CIOL)
- While Twitter gets the press, Germany is now a Facebook stronghold (17 December 2009, Techcrunch)
- Q&A: IDC Forecast for Management 2009 (17 December 2009, CIO)
- How Open-Source Software Can Affect A Company’s Value (17 December 2009, CIO)
- UK aerospace outsourcing (14 December 2009, The Manufacturer)
- Mittelstands-IT: Vom Unterstützer zum Gestalter (15 December 2009, Silicon)
- Lünendonk: Dienstleistungen werden immer komplexer (17 December 2009, Silicon)
- Twitter spricht jetzt auch Deutsch (17 December 2009, Computerwoche)
- Währungen: Das Vertrauen in den Euro bröckelt (18 December 2009, Welt)

It is clear where Pentalog has made the difference in comparison to the competition, it is by proposing, in addition to its software maintenance services (which everyone proposes), specialized offshore R & D. Our clients have entrusted us with at least 50% of their software development, in addition to their maintenance.

This has led frequently to several other business models and lots of creativity… Today, after having helped in the start-up of PeopleCentric, and including participating in the development of many other new products / concepts / solutions, we have noted that we have been missing something essential, a true innovation unit, which would help to improve and professionalize our services like what we have brought to PeopleCentric. Raluca has indeed benefited from the operational support of Eric and Monica, who also participated in the definition of the initial strategy. Similarly, I was able to help her find her a very talented person to become her French associate director.

In contrast, Pentalog has not yet been able to play the role of technological innovator that it could have expected to become. It has only been associated in the “realization”.

For this reason we are preparing to launch an incubator program that would create an innovation team that could actually be called Pentalog Labs (but we’re still open for a choice of names).

Concerning our incubator strategy: Yes, we are preparing to unveil a program included in the 30-2013 plan, which will include the acquisition of equity for Pentalog in start-up enterprises. Along with the first dossier of People Centric, we will address the needs of the software world and information technology. They will be in the world of social networking, recruitment, skill assessment and management, but also production management and software productivity.

I would like to appeal to all my Pentalog counterparts for ideas. We will qualify their ideas, evaluate them, and we will provide the means for development, management and marketing. In the future, we will help them find the appropriate financing for the development of their ideas and their businesses.

Similarly, we will call on people outside of the group, interested by an investment in their business through providing engineering capital. We envision three possible poles to host the Pentalog incubator: France (Orleans), Romania (Brasov and or Iasi) and Vietnam (Hanoi).

About Pentalog Labs: it will have at the starting point a group consisting of a financial advisor, a professional marketing, the Pentalog Chief Data Base Officer and Chief Software Architect Officer, the Network Guru Officer and one or two talented analysts. The headquarters will probably be in Romania, in Brasov or Iasi. I like the idea of Brasov, except for what continues to bother me is the damn problem of accessibility. But I love the environment and I hope this team can regularly enjoy the lovely countryside. Being chased by a bear regularly keeps you close to the realities of life Brasov is the logical place to create a Romanian Silicon Valley. It’s a shame there is still no airport to easily get to this magnificent city! This team will be there to offer the support to any truly innovative idea, whether from customers or from the group. It is under the direct responsibility of Aymeric, but it is possible that I will take an active role also in it.

December 08, in Iasi (Romania), December 09 in Bucharest and finally on the 15th of December in Orleans AFNOR auditors in charge of monitoring our ISO9001-2008 certification, which we acquired last year, came to make their first monitoring audit.

Development projects (our biggest one and 3 smaller ones), the Human resources process, Technical assistance services and facilities management but also the transversal processes (IS, sales ,..) were scrutinized. The findings were direct and unambiguous: 7 strong points, 0 sensitive issues, 0 non-compliance, and 4 process improvement tracks.

These results are very encouraging concerning our approach to quality. Our improvement loops (PDCA) will continue to monitor our development program to approach CMMI level 3.

This could not have been possible without the effort of everyone involved in executing the processes but also those who were audited and those who helped in the preparation. I would also like to note another key to this success: Aleth and her strong personal investment in her function as quality director.

The next set of guidelines has already been launched. I will soon write another note on a topic which I hold close to my heart: Change management and the training we will provide to Pentalog managers on this topic.

I received a few comments by letter, following my post concerning the aftermath of the presidential elections in Romania. I wish in particular to clarify that I do not condemn more Traian Basescu than the other politicians… as a Romanian politician. Simply he is the incumbent President and his record is what it is: inadequate or bad. The fact that he spent three-quarters of his term coexisting does not excuse everything. Concerning the subject on which he expressed himself the most, the fight against corruption, has not seen much progress neither. From the view point of the Romanian international audience, it has constantly worsened during his mandate and the management of the country’s stature abroad is far from adequate.

Companies have yet to find a viable interlocutor and corruption in public procurement is still prevalent.

I am not pronouncing in favor or against President Basescu, which would make no sense, but more concerning the political methods used by him as well as by the others. I wanted to see a President who could have profited during the past 5 years in power to gain stature and who would have worked for Romania. Alas, the Romanian President is a politician like all the other politicians in Romania and I can only regret having not seen him have a better understanding of the financial situation of his country.

The actual Pentalog strategy is to increase the development of a local customer base in our marketing plan. Let’s make it clear that we do not want to know and do not want to work under the table like so some many others. I realize to my regret that it is practically compulsory, but to bad… we are not obliged to do so… Our local private sector clients are professionals and with complete integrity. This being said, we will continue to work with them. As for public procurement, we’ll see what the new government will do in this area.

But don’t come to me and tell me this does not apply to all foreign companies. Pentalog, this year in Romania will pay taxes of 5 to 6 digits and which will fund many envelopes and from this point of view, Pentalog is like many other Romanian companies, without privileges.

Bucharest, Romania is still groggy, tired, and disgusted after the elections that have just finished. Everyone lost. Everyone? No, invariably there is someone who has not lost and that someone is the outgoing President, Traian Basescu. All the parties have lost, the business community has lost, and now the country is headed towards bankruptcy. 70% of the Romanian GDP, up to now has been based on consumption and shopping malls which sprouted like mushrooms and now are empty.

How did we get there? Why didn’t industry develop in medium sized cities? It’s very simple. In Romania, nobody (or almost nobody) made the necessary investments. Neither the state nor the local private equity funds. Everything HAD TO COME from the outside: from multinational investments, Europe… I was talking with industrialists the other evening at a gala of the French Chamber of Commere in Romania. The road infrastructure has utterly condemned all investment in Romania. No one wants to pay their income taxes: 40% of the economy remains informal! Those who protested the most against the corruption of power are the same people who are using these illicit means to make money. One of our friends, a business leader, told us the other day that at a public bid of several hundreds of thousands of euros, government officials requested kick backs representing close to 40% of the total bid… not bad for a country without money. Because of course, to pay 40% commission, you must first of all increase the market price. So it is the taxpayers and citizens who will pay. 40%… the enormity of the figure just blew me away!

The atmosphere is worse now than when I arrived in Romania ten years ago and at that time the country was teeming with energy and hope, despite the enormity of the task. Everyone is tired of the mediocrity of the political class. What excuses can you find for a president who refuses to make political compromises when the country could possibly sink into bankruptcy? Why can’t a head of state be held responsible for bankruptcy as it would be for a CEO of a company? Where is the difference? However, the actual situation is this: no government, no money from the IMF. But what about the political parties that are not longer able to come to terms with the president? Will they now play the politic of the worst case scenario? Basescu wanted to take this risk, so he must assume totally the responsibility! At the highest level of multinational companies that I have had the opportunity to rub shoulders with they acknowledge in secret the possibility of the following scenario, that we would leave the EU. I even believe that the EU must push hard on this subject. The Romanians will only move when they are pushed into a corner. 10 years of mismanagement. Sorry, my friends, it is only because I care for you that I say this!

During this time the Romanians in the diaspora who do not live with the local difficulties still support Basescu, who continues to embody in their eyes the normalization of the image of Romania. The following day after the elections, seeing how the diaspora voted for Basescu, one of the most important leaders of the Social Democratic Party, said, without laughing, that the voices of the Diaspora should be reduced by a certain percentage! I now see Romania has been divided in two, exhausted by its moral turpitude and I am extremely saddened by the spectacle it offers the world.

Of course I hope for a better tomorrow, but when will they come? It is legitimate to ask, in a country which will celebrate in a few weeks the end of the Ceausescu dictatorship… that no one will celebrate. But how, when Ion Iliescu is still the scourge of students in 1991… who continues cynically to pull the strings? Here, moreover, at a time when everyone is blaming Basescu that Uncle Ionut, who has left the political scene without even passing by prison can there be a solution? Could Mircea Geona have practically won this election if he had not supported in 90-91 this tyrant? Who knows?

I think it would be for the good of Romania, see the country turn the page and to forget the last of the communist era and the sinister foundations of the modern Romania.

A new sandwich:

- Les Pentaloguiens ont lancé les élections pour le Pentoscar: http://bit.ly/7wIVdw
- seated at his desk for 3 hours now!
- RalucaOtelea is still looking for a Business Analyst (for a social networking-based application) and a Community Manager.
- George superstar: http://www.cevadiferit.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&layout=blog&id=9&Itemid=85
- Pentalog will soon report a new half a million $ contract (media industry)
- @_JSH_ some of my tweets are written in french and some other in english depending on target and topic

I would like to publish this article from Guy:

… survived the frenzied, dantesque, terrifying traffic of Hanoi. The first confrontation is frightening; one is paralyzed when seeing this steady stream of motorcycles in front of you. Impenetrable, insurmountable, and certainly not linear and spread out: everyone changes lanes or direction about 200 times per kilometer and keeps preferably to the right, just before turning left and crossing the complete flow of traffic. Or vice versa.
Sometimes at night on a one way street 30 m wide, fully occupied, you will find a bike with no lights going down the street the wrong way, nothing out of the ordinary; he just saved himself 500 m doing so. Signal lights are unknown.

The favorite vehicle is the super bike of local production, perfectly suited to its environment. Two or three brands share the market, but THE MUST is actually the Honda Wave (97 cm3, 4 stroke, a great gearbox without a clutch).

Wave or not, all these bikes are perfectly quiet (too bad we don’t have the
same in France!), they do not give off any exhaust fumes and are built to last forever. It must be said that motorbike pooling is widely practiced here, up to two adults and three children on the same bike. One can just as easily carry a 123 cm television not attached to the carrier or 50 live ducks. Scooters are also making inroads, especially amongst the girls.

If there were only 2 wheels vehicles, everything could be understood. But there are also the cars, more and more of them. And not just small ones, particularly in the better neighborhoods! In principle, the Hanoi driver does not tolerate anyone in front of him, motorcycle or car. So he honks almost continuously to clear the passage. Totally spent after 10,000 kilometers, the horn must be changed every oil change, along with the oil filter.

But you will mostly likely say to me, that such a way to drive is incompatible with what we know of the Vietnamese State, we would assume that they would make everyone go in the right direction and quietly! That is without knowing this proud people who advance whatever happens, all in the same direction, but each in his own way!

Days pass. You take a taxi four times a day, and then you walk; you begin to dare to cross the stream of traffic, putting at risk your life. Perhaps you make a trip on the back seat of a motorcycle, putting in danger again… And then things become more and more understandable, the monster becomes less threatening, all these motorcyclists are applying the same rule, a totally opportunistic way of driving, each person takes immediate possession of whatever space is being liberated in front of him, left or right. This asynchronous behavior that optimizes time and road space is possible. And no sign of aggression in all of this, just an obsession to win some time, so important to these people who never stop…

And I’m starting to dream. A dream of a less civilized western world, with fewer rules,
fewer prohibitions and obligations. Fewer radars. A world where we could drive more spontaneously, take more advantage of the moment, more in tune with the traffic and the weather. But I know that those looking after us are watching, and will give nothing.

Well my boy, maybe I’ll immigrate to Vietnam after all? But as long as they do not make me eat dog or cobra on the floor! Definitely not that!

Guy LASNIER

The 2nd PentaMac of the week:

- en audit de surveillance
- à Orléans
- petite réponse sur les élections roumaines sur www.pentablog.fr

- Google Takes Search Real-Time (07 December 2009, Technology Review)
- The hidden costs of identity theft (07 December 2009, CNN)
- Cloud computing, virtualization, open source poised for big gains (09 December 2009, Infoworld)
- Outsourcing Prices Likely to Drop in 2010, But at What Cost? (10 December 2009, CIO)
- How to Improve Your IT Planning in 2010 (08 December 2009, CIO)
- 10 predictions for 2010 (11 December 2009, CIO)
- IT Is The New Normal: McKinsey Survey Results (09 December 2009, Forbes)
- ICT services show signs of recovery (11 December 2009, CIOL)
- Europa-Studie: Deutsche IT-Dienstleister haben Entwicklung verschlafen (08 December 2009, Computerwoche)
- Business Intelligence: Sechs Thesen zum deutschen BI-Markt (10 December 2009, CIO)
- IT wird wichtiger (14 December 2009, Silicon)

A new week:

- #Hanoi, #Vietnam: Je suis venu, j’ai vu, j’ai survécu : http://bit.ly/7toG57
- Pentalog vous propose d’externaliser votre activité CRM et ainsi d’optimiser vos coûts grâce à notre équipe de professionnels.
- Réduisez vos coûts grâce au BPO: http://bit.ly/8RSEgz
- Programator JAVA (RBRA406): Descrierea postului : In vederea extinderii echipelor pentru proiectele in curs si cele… http://bit.ly/6TzDRc
- Programator .NET (RBRA405): Descrierea postului : In vederea extinderii echipelor pentru proiectele in curs si cele… http://bit.ly/5YTo2h
- Programator JAVA/J2EE (RSIB404): Descrierea postului : Pentalog Romania anunta lansarea unui nou proiect la agentia… http://bit.ly/7lfa8f

Have a nice weekend:

- business lunch at 13 in Bucharest… flying to Chisinau at 1??? Livia, help me!!!
- I’m terribly late with blogging. omany thing to tell you a bout the situation in Ro / Md. I’ll try to write someting in plane.
- c’est un aquaboniste, un genre de jemenfoutiste qui dit toujours akoibon, akoibon
- In chisinau P5 office. Was in Club France Petit déjeuner about Education in Moldova. Pretty interesting, lots of ideas. To be continued…
- Pentalog pitched out a reflexion in Club France Meeting about mortgage for Euro paid employees. Good feedback from banks. back soon on topic
- Meeting with an Tel Aviv friend… Pentalog in Israel?
- Tonight dîner by the President of Société Générale in Moldavia within Club France

During my trip to Hanoi, to set up with Iulia a development team for the ISD, I took the opportunity to visit a new “open”� Datacenter. As I explained in a previous post, our network strategy is to deploy a regional strategic point in an open Datacenter to have greater flexibility.

Indeed, we have to consider that a growing branch will expand every 12 to 16 months. This expansion implies moving. If we were obliged to move systematically the international links, it would increase significantly the budget of the expansion. The strategy is to “freeze” the international linkages that allow us to control our quality service throughout. Then, the links between the data center and regional branches are more accessible and less expensive to move.

In preparation for a potential opening of a second branch in Vietnam (Da Nang, Hue or Ho Chi Minh City) I went to visit this Datacenter on the outskirts of Hanoi and close to our branch office. I have already had the opportunity to visit several data centers in France and Romania. But I confess that I was impressed by the level of this one:

- External and internal access control 24H/day
- Video surveillance circuit of 70 cameras
- Double power supply but only one national provider
- Double generator set with 72 hours of autonomy
- Double UPS circuit with 20 min of autonomy
- Operator hosting room (currently 6)
- Bay hosting space of 500 m²
- Additional services: data recovery room, rollout room…

I was very impressed by the services made redundant, as well as the environmental quality and technical skills of the interlocutors. There are not many hosting possibilities available at this level in Hanoi, certainly a bit more in Ho Chi Minh City.

The strength of this type of this hosting service is the presence of many operators who will be able to ensure the necessary interconnections. For that provider it is still low. Most rely mostly on the capacity of NTT (the historical Japanese operator) who have invested also in the Datacenter sector.

Our project is progressing. It will be achieved when we have completed our search for international operators and we have sufficient bandwidth for our services. We also need to negotiate the best rates possible and therefore we are playing the game of competition between the different operators.

Prices are changing rapidly. We are presently negotiating with our two current operators to double our bandwidth for the same rate.

Dinner is served:

- Pentalog est a la recherche d’un Directeur de Projets: http://bit.ly/6×4KRY
- Roissy Terminal 2B – flying to Bucharest
- @lclementz: La multi ani, mon ami!