Tuesday, August 31, 2010

It will not get better for Invensys until there is a significant change in the culture of leadership. "Do as I say, not as I do", has been that standard operating procedure for a long time. At IOM we have senior leaders that are in so far in over thier heads there is no possible way to recover. Sudipta and the team he has surrounded himself with spend more time on crafting a story to tell rather than addressing clients needs. Most of the team is fearful of being in the room with a client or salesperson as they might be asked a difficult question. For those of you that work closely with the ELT (Executive Leadership Team) you know that anytime there is going to be confrontation they run and hide. There is a culture of passive/aggressive behavior that starts with the CEO and filters through the entire organization. The culture of Wonderware has been imploded, and that was intended. The plan was to offshore the talent to Sudipta's native land of India. If you want to succeed at Invensys the game is very simple. Nod your head yes to whatever you are asked to do. Don't show any courage as that will get you pushed to the door. Any decision you make that is right, let your boss take credit.

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Most of the people who wanted to create MES and Advanced Apps with great ease of use were unceremoniously driven out of Wonderware by the new leaders and their minions. Leader of the pack was none other than the recently demoted Pankaj Mody who time and time again stood in the way of any developments that he didn't personally initiate, which incidentally were very few and were of little customer value.

It is really a tragedy what has become of the company that Dennis, Phil, Cole, and the rest of the real Wonderware team built. It is in the hands of a misguided group of misfits who are terribly far beyond their competency levels.

With the board solidly in his pocket, there's little that will displace Ooof (that's the sound of the gut punch he's given to the company) and his band of incompetent outsourcers who have nothing but a cost focus and little or no customer focus.

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.

Monday, August 30, 2010

I have noticed that there is a disconnect between marketing and the reality of Invensys product ease-of-use. Wonderware specfically. Why is it for a company like Invensys that outsources so much including HR and Development, that most often the first item that companies outsource is support. Invensys has not done such but its not something to be proud of as much. It speaks to ease of use of the software and licensing and training. My experience with Invensys is that most distribution cannot handle the advanced apps and new releases for several years, nor do they want to take the risk of investing. So one would conclude that the ease of use and configurabilty that is marketed is more marketing than reality. While the platform is viable, it is costly as far as engineering and support is concerned. To be fair the other vendors are not much better. As a consumer, I can't see how the mass marketability of automation solution is viable until companies like Invensys, who previously had a mass marketed HMI platform, can turn the tables again and provide a real sustainable platform for MES and Advanced Apps.

Where is the leadership and customer focus now? Or is the CEO mantra of just good enough to snow us going to be to new standard? Sounds like a house of cards waiting for some innovative player to knock down. Same for ABB, Siemens, Rockwell etc. As vendors, customers, partners, we should should demand more not less.

Monday, August 30, 2010 - Concerned:

As an outsider, ie non Invensys employee or distributor, its very distrubing to see so much chaos being shouted about on this blog. I will have to say, outside of OpsManage promotion and a few aquisitions, I really have no idea about what Invensys is doing these days. I am commenting on the Operations Management side.

I am most familiar with the process side of the business and have to say also it seems like the push into facilities seems far afield for this company given its focus. Also I am suprised about the push into energy managment, when the likes of ABB and Siemens seem must better positioned and experienced. There has been no news of customers in those areas at all and one would think large list of successes would have been out there by now.

It's very confusing as to what this Operations Management Organization wants. I would think the VPs in the product managment and marketing groups must be held to blame for the lack of newsworthy progress. Where is the success of this new organziation? I would think it's time for accountability actions to directed at VPs now.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

I know that this space was not intended as a bitch fest. But I feel I must say this. I being a long time FOXBORO employee(30+years) must speak out. I have seen Foxboro go from an industrial leader to a stumbling confused mislead entity. The leaders we had here who had a vision for the company were forced out, and VASTLY INCOMPETENT leadership were put in place. The morale here is bad; management is not liked or trusted. The culture-of-cheap has settled in. The Bristols built FOXBORO on the idea to build the best instrument that they could. Now this crowd has the philsophy: build it good enough. Our customers have noticed. Look at our market-share.

Now I know the economy is bad but..... This culture that is in power which is including IPS'S version of Leona Helmsley to the present leadership and their cost cutting methods, leave me shaking my head. They tell people who already do over-and-above that they are just doing their job's. That now you have to go so far above and beyond it is impossible to satisfy management. You see, according to our illustrious V.P in charge of manufacturing, the hourly employees make too much money, get too many benefits and don't produce enough. So they think peasants salaries are out of line, but management salaries are just dandy.

Well I am proud to say they made their goal - they make a cheaper instrument by buying cheaper parts and paying cheaper wages. I guess for the rest of us, our costs haven't gone up. Maybe I can tell the gas company, electric company, heating oil contractor and the supermarket to cut their prices. How about we tell the city and towns where we live maybe they will lower our taxes (good luck on that one).

Management has shown a disregard for the common person. I'm on my second year with no raise. I know my job and I am good at it. I'm not the only one who feels this way; many of my fellow workers are hard working and very talented. It is just a shame that we go unappreciated and under valued. It is also a shame we have to work for a bunch of elitist jerks!

Sunday, August 22, 2010

There's a great article on "How To Tell When Your Boss Is Lying" that could be valuable when listening to the company meetings: http://www.economist.com/node/16847818?fsrc=scn%2Ffb%2Fwl%2Far%2Fwhenyourbossislying

Monday, August 2, 2010 - To the "marketing person" in Lake Forest:

I am also in marketing and I an assure you, there are no 2 hour bike rides in my day. Call me--I'll help you take up your slack...

Sunday, August 1, 2010

Safe and secure in Lake Forest? Mike Bradley – Gone, VP finance position eliminated, VP HR position eliminated, VP sales position eliminated, Lake Forest based marketing positions eliminated, countless development positions outsourced, middle management decimated, remaining management moved to Dallas. But yeah, those free M&M’s make this place a paradise!

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

(Click)Excellent Harvard Business Review analysis of the impact of outsourcing on innovation.

Invensys management fiddles while the company burns, and the new VP of development at IOM will continue the destructive trend. Trying to innovate without domain experience is like trying to run a marathon without preparation. A rare few can do it, most will fail and suffer greatly, and a few will die trying.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010 - Marketing department here...

We are used to marketing only software to a niche market that already needed our product. Meaning we are used to really doing nothing beyond a few random client stories about how they love our product. We are used to our free snacks in Lake Forest that none of the rest of you get and taking 2 hour bike rides in the afternoon in beautiful California. We aren't going to change this for anything and if you think we intend to learn about the boring rest of the business, forget it. Sudipta is from Wonderware so we are not really accountable for anything. We are safe and secure and we intend to stay that way.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Regarding Rail (and many of the Invensys businesses), the "HR woman" is much more than that. She is Ulf's confidant, and she is not to be trusted at all, if you're wise.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

How exactly do you think the "new guy" heading development will reignite innovation? His own online profiles indicate that his specialties are in cost reduction, not output increase. Those are two very different things. He is there to carry the outsourcing flag as far as he possibly can, at the direction of Ulf and Sudipta, and at the expense of customers and employees.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

The Rail group is definitely having big problems. Diemetronic has got problems in its home market and the Sao Paulo project has problems. In the UK, the Engineering Director just got the sack - a good guy, but another fall guy for James Drummond's failings. In fact, the whole exec team has been pushed out over the past year causing massive instability. I'm hearing that there's a multi million hole in the profit forecast and that Ulf and Freeburger are personally supervising the business. James Drummond is a dead man walking - since there's no-one left to blame (unless he thinks the HR woman is the one who caused all the problems) - thank goodness since he's the one who's milked it dry.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

In defense of Sudipta, who is a marketing guy at heart, the issue isn't so much a lack of marketing output but rather, a lack of much of anything interesting to talk about.

Monday, July 26, 2010

I'm hearing that the rail part of the business is in freefall, and that a profits warning is due. I guess the exec team has milked the cash cow dry...

Sunday, July 25, 2010

1. Pankaj has been demoted for sure. I question his effectiveness as a technical leader after staying away from technology for years. But we hope for the best. We have a wrong culture as we keep all old R&D VPs around (one in Foxboro and now one in Lake Forest) and they fail to add any value and be in the way to real change.
2. The new VP of IOM R&D is a buddy of Sudipta. We hope that helps us to become a lean organization for delivering new and quality products to stay competitive. OPMO (Outsourcing group) has become a clerical group with no vision of how to leverage Cognizant for making the relationship successful for Invensys business benefit. Cognizant is also playing along and collecting large sum of money every month. R&D Ops group is mobilizing many of its resources on large number of no-value add activities that seem to add very little value to our core strength of software innovation and development. Pankaj was getting along with it as he had no other ideas and interest for managing such a large integrated organization. We all can hope that the new VP will make a difference.
3. It seems like everyone in the management team is working on to create their own value to the organization for keeping them employed rather than adding real value to the business for growth. This is against what we have been preached through our values as it creates a very different culture from where we want to go as a company.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Dear Marketing,

What happened to press releases about new products being introduced, customer wins? Promotional offers? Whitepapers of value? I don't think I have seen it so quiet from Invensys. When there was Wonderware and different management it was not the case. As a partner in sales its obvious that the company is focused on its navel and less and less on development and marketing. Seems like Ulf might have really underestimated the value of Mike Bradley vs Sudipta approach. Numbers dont lie as a track record. Not sure what the bench mark of a success is right now. Hope they have some real marketing and development folks step up and do something about it.

Saturday, July 24, 2010 - RE: relocate to other engagements other than Invesys after one year completion in Cognizant:

This is most prevalent in the ODC MES group. Their miseries are two-fold, from Cognizant side they are represented by useless Director (AA) and Senior Manager (MES) who never understands and addresses their true concerns; from Invensys side they are controlled by notorious gang whose intentions are directed towards defaming the ODC employees

Saturday, July 24, 2010

The mismanagement of then Invensys IDC management helped Invensys to easily outsource the complete IDC development team to Cognizant. But the pitiable fact is that same management (except the ex-VP IDC) is managing the team at ODC and the team's misery is continuing there. If the leads coming from ODC are true, most of them want to relocate to other engagements other than Invesys after one year completion.

Friday, July 16, 2010

Again July 25 coming up. It's two years now. The act of betrayal by then Invensys IDC management to Principal Engineers is still unforgettable. All senior technical engineers at Principal Engineer level are insulted by demoting then by one level.

It is something that no organization would think of doing. But IDC management under the leadership of then Vice President shamed for nothing to do so.

Through this forum, I want to convey to the members of that leadership team, 'Hey, please don't do this again to anyone again, the psychological trauma that you caused is still playing on us'

Friday, July 16, 2010

As much as I hope Pankaj's demotion helps us get back on track, do we really have any reason to believe that it will? I am surprised that we keep him around as CTO since he is not a CTO. And the new guy is certainly going to increase the number of jobs moving out of IOM or definitely out of the US, that's clearly why they brought him in. I wish I find a reason to be happy about the change, but I feel much more confused now than ever.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Don't worry, #3 has begun. One can be reasonably assured that Sudipta will not last out the year. He just traded from bad to worse in development. Talent management. Ha ha.

Monday, July 12, 2010

What is IOM now? And what is it that Sudipta wants it to really become? It would be good to know, beyond the marketing spin which is nonesense and recycled over and over again. There are a lot of theories I am sure, but not much coming out from the top these days, and as a result I can't help but have similar opinions.

Seems the focus of the employees is around internal strife and not around a real vision that anyone can sign up for. It's very disheartening to see so many employess on all these blogs just complain. But you cannot blame them if they work at a place that they don't believe in, or even worse, that the customers dont.

The company has placed so little resources into it energy management, facilities, and manufacturing industry initiatives since the revenue quota is peanuts compared to the traditional large DCS business. Strategic Accounts managers will never spend time to grow new business. Seem that other players 1/4 Invensys' size will be posied to take the market and new business opportunity. Could be time for a new round of medium players to enter the field as companies like Invensys have their hands full and their direct and indirect channels spread so thin that they are forced to focus on a handful of programs and certainly not the number that President has dreams of.

It's been said that big companies are well known for being good at a few things.

1. If there is a problem - restructure
2. If there is problem with sales - cut costs
3. If those two don't work, send off the management and start over.

Friday, July 9, 2010

I worked at Invensys for less than a year and here is my honest opinion:

The good:

1. Great company as far as benefits and development environments.
2. Great pool of talents. I met some of the most talented engineers in the industry.

1. The team manager did not know how to shield the team from the management nonsense so we can focus on the task at hand.
2. Again, our manager, even though a nice person, he did not know the difference between encouraging people and insulting them.
3. The idea of getting great talents to fix and maintain 15 years old code did not appeal to me or any of the other team members.
4. The competition is leap-frogging forward while Invensys management insists on using that great pool of talents to move at the speed of a turtle.

Hey management, you still have chance to compete and go back to be #1. Use your talented engineers and listen to what they have to say because they are not that crazy and you are not really as good as you think you are.

Monday, June 28, 2010

I'm coming up to a year since my departure (and the departure of some 40 other people) from Wonderware and I'm increasingly amazed that I put up with working there as long as I did. The pay was good and the benefits were very good but the abusive atmosphere was brutal. My new job doesn't tolerate teacher's pets and we are going to do between $10M and $18M more business this year than last year (which is not bad when you only have a dozen or so employees).

I got laid off and I was out of work for long enough to relax, then I started my new job at a substantial increase. Nobody takes payoffs, we believe in operating ethically, and morale is great. I'm happy.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

8 Steps How to destroy running business by a leaders vision

1. A leader has a vision
2. Destroy established company names and built up one virtual company
3. destroy the grown spirtits of these companies
4. Try to create a new comon spirit
5. Instal level 2,3,4 managers who dont care about visions and spirit
6. Demotivate people and create fluctuation of the best knowledge
7. Fail and create unemployment
8. Turn arround and try again elswhere

Friday, June 18, 2010 - Adding on to IOM-specific performance:

Morale: Down 90%
Market Position: Down 50%
CEO Friends in Key Positions: Up 80%
Industry Expertise: Down 30%
Innovation: NaN - too low to measure
Bad Aquisition Ratio: Up %100 (CEO is 0 for 2)
Prospects for Survival As Independent Company: Down 98.9%

Friday, June 18, 2010

The Invensys Operations Management numbers are not quite as impressive. Per their annual report, page 19:
http://www.invensys.com/isys/docs/ar/2010/Invensys_AR_2010.pdf

IOM:
Orders Down 17%
Revenue Down 9%
Profit Down 23%
Employees Down 10%
(This includes their 5th President of the Process Group in the past 10 years.)

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Here's some positive news: http://www.invensys.com/media/default.asp?top_nav_id=3&nav_id=3&action=detail&content_no_id=876

Pretty impressive to keep revenues and order book up in these trying times. I do feel that the R&D side is still quite broken, though.

Financial highlights – continuing operations (extracts):
• Group order book increased to £2,307 million (2009: £2,083 million), up 11% (10% at CER2) with 40% now represented by orders from emerging markets
• Order intake was £2,473 million (2009: £2,806 million), down 12% (17% at CER); order intake is up 21% compared with two years ago
• Revenue was £2,243 million (2009: £2,284 million), down 2% (8% at CER)
• Operating profit before exceptional items3 rose 2% (down 4% at CER) to £248 million (2009: £244 million) and operating profit after exceptional items rose 25% (up 18% at CER) to £223 million (2009: £178 million)
• Operating margin rose from 10.7% to 11.1% with each division producing double digit operating margins in the second half
• Basic earnings per share rose 6% to 18.5p (2009: 17.4p)
• Operating cash flow was £265 million (2009: £298 million) and operating cash conversion was 107% (2009: 122%); free cash flow was £100 million (2009: £296 million) reflecting the incidence of one-off cash inflows last year including the PPP settlement credit
• Recommended final dividend of 2.0p per share (2009: 1.5p per share); total dividends of 3.0p per share (2009: 1.5p per share)
• Continued strong financial position with no debt, net cash totalling £363 million and an investment grade rating from Standard & Poor’s

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

The last poster (regarding WonderWare growth) is clearly not management, or they would understand some basic finance and business metrics. Revenue growth is merely one measure, profitability is entirely another, and in this area WonderWare has likely been an underperformer. Calculate the CAGR of either (revenues or profitability) over the past five years for a more relevant statistic that gauges the performance of the current leadership regime.

The real source of WonderWare's consistent growth and success of the past two decades is the best distribution and service channel in the industry. An analysis of revenues would also likely indicate a brand loyalty that results in a consistent stream of service contracts and maintenance revenue, which has little to do with new business. Much of the incremental revenue over the past 10-15 years have been the result of acquisitions, rather than organic creation of new offerings. WonderWare's primary business is also in a fiercely competitive market with price erosion underway from all directions, most notably in emerging/emergent econonomies where local competitors are often one order of magnitude cheaper with comparable functionality.

In order to maintain revenue levels, the company will need to play either the acquisition game - which often is erosive to profitability - or the customer squeeze game by upping maintenance contract costs - which is erosive to customer goodwill.

This is a challenging climate in which to be a leader. New competition & choice, economic uncertainty, globalization challenges, and eroding price models make it no easy task. The more immediate opportunities for WonderWare lie in cost-cutting and fiscal discipline.

Monday, June 7, 2010

10 years ago Wonderware revenue was under $70 million; this past year it was close to $200 milllion and still growing in the double digits. While Foxboro has had problems overall, it is showing improvment.

By the way, I am not management. Stop whining !

Monday, June 7, 2010

The first two posts for June 6 are obviously upper management wasting breath. It's the same rhetoric I heard 10 to 20 years ago, and Invensys has only gotten worse; its holdings have lost sales and market value. I left Foxboro 10 years ago and have thrived under a company that actually does allow its workers to contribute in a positive way. Invensys is a stifling "yes man" environment, whose middle-level managers are not allowed to do anything on their own. Puppets right down from the top. People leave not because they are bitter; they leave on a positive note because they want to make a difference, and that's not allowed at Foxboro. So they go where they are allowed to succeed.

Answer me this: Foxboro sales on its own were $600M in 1982 and about $800M in the late 1990s. They were not reported on their own, other companies were blended in to disguise the lack of growth. What are they now? My company has had a sales increase of 50% in the the 10 years that I've been here.

Don't try to BS people. They know better. Invensys is a big vacuum (as in negative) that sucks money out and leaves nothing of value.

Sunday, June 6, 2010

How, pray tell, are we positioned for growth? IOM has been in paralysis since Sudipta took over - or for that matter, since Paulette took over - or for that matter since Pankaj took his role.

The disaster of trying to make WonderWare work in the DCS space has cost us hundreds of millions of dollars in real costs of engineering and marketing, lost opportunities in delivering a better solution to our customers, and lost business. Rail is still a series of disjointed regional operating companies instead of a unified global force in transportation - which it could be with some support from ISYS. Appliances? Despite fits and starts and some good innovations, ISYS will not decide whether it wants to invest or divest and has it trapped in zombieland. Ulf fiddles while the portfolio businesses burn, but his hand picked board and carefully selected and placed leaders dare not turn on him.

We have powerful well known brands. We have a massive amount of domain expertise in our respective business. We have a fantastic future with the right leadership. We do not have that leadership today.

Sunday, June 6, 2010

You are completely correct. It appears that a few disgruntled people are making up facts. I do know for sure that most of the facts on this weblogntend to be disproven over time. On the the hand a lot of people do seem unhappy. Maybe if people with out any real facts kept quiet for a while someone whonwas unhappy could articulate why in a somewhat less overwrough way. Who knowns maybe a manager or two reads this weblog and could make a change.

Sunday, June 6, 2010

You should all quit your whining and refocus that negative energy into something positive to support the company and make it better. Despite the remarks of the disgruntled few, Invensys is well positioned for growth. Most of the information posted on the blog is not factual and is based on opinions of bitter people. Get over it.

Saturday, June 5, 2010

The backroom battles and tensions between the various IOM regional presidents are reaching a fever pitch of late. Something has to give soon. Who will win?

Saturday, May 22, 2010 - Re Brand recognition and loss....Totally agree!

But while the marketing man may have worked for Wonderware previously, he had absolutely nothing to do with the growth of the Wonderware brand - which grew selling shrink wrapped software, not services. He started the process of killing that before IOM was formed. Wonderware was grown not by Wonderware, but by the distributor channel that embraced it as their own. Where will they be in 12 months?

Friday, May 21, 2010

Invensys just bought Skelta. Like they know anything about Business Process Management! Another waste of money into the software space where they have failed miserably before! Once again they will try to get a sales force that can only sell products to sell software and solutions that they know nothing about. Haven't we seen this before?

Friday, May 21, 2010

Brand recognition value and loss: Congratulations, Invensys for flushing awesome recognizable brands like Foxboro, Triconex and Wonderware down the toilet. Foxboro brings in most of the cash that the rest of the company squanders on pipe dreams of becoming a solutions company when 75% of all income comes from M&I products. Every year the brand degrades a little more. Minimal R&D is put toward maintaining the edge Foxboro was famous for. Soon the products will be outdated and the brand name will be lost and your cash cow will be gone. Then what will you do? Within 5 years Invensys will collapse as this is the financial foundation propping up the regime. Go to www.foxboro.com or www.triconex.com. The logos that users have seen for generations are no longer on the website at all. Who is the marketing executive (idiot) who is so determined to flush all of these years of brand recognition down the toilet? Fire them all. For a change fire someone who deserves it. Oh yeah, they are from Wonderware; no wonder they keep their jobs...

Thursday, May 20, 2010

So, the buzz is we're prepping for additional acquisitions. Isn't that just precious? Spend a boatload of the company's money, just because we have product marketing managers with no clue of what customers want and a development head who stands in the way of anything that customers actually want. And we have to buy elsewhere. Fix the problem, stop attaching more band aids.

Friday, May 14, 2010

The only change that is happening with the Invensys name changes is a shrinking market share for Triconex & Foxboro. Talking of the Middle East market, it's hard to recollect when Triconex or Foxboro last won a real competitive ESD / DCS bid against the likes of Honeywell, Yokogawa and Emerson. The Invensys Middle East team has even managed what no one in the world has done: They have managed to lose some proprietary jobs to system integrators. The calibre of the CSE and TCS is abysmal and the exodus of good trained personnel continues to be replaced by nodding heads who would not know the difference between an ESD and a DCS. It's time the corporate office moves in and clears off all the dead-wood at the top and gets a lean, mean fighting outfit in place. There's lot's of business out there - but not for Invensys in it's present form.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

If anyone had any expectations of Wonderware Studios delivering anything usefull in any time frame that was appropriate, they are severely deluded! One advert and one or two brochures per years is all they have ever managed, and even then those generally missed the target - the made excuses that the advert was there to highten awareness. One day they might tell the world what Wonderware actually has to offer. The Wonderware web sites have always been the most disorganised, hyped and out--of-date sites. 99% of the customers I talk to finish up hitting the Pacwest website to get support.

Sunday, May 9, 2010

No one is talking about the "Tail Wagging the Dog" syndrome going on throughout the organization. At every turn, Wonderware people are being promoted regardless of skills in the position they are being put in. All others in key positions are quietly being let go or forced out. It is a witch-hunt to rid the organization of anyone who was deemed (IPS/EDS) or part of Paulette's team. Talent is being replaced by Wonderware cheerleaders regardless of skillset. When are they going to see that these Wonderware people know how to run million dollar businesses and will fail miserably with the Billion dollar businesses they are being put in charge of? When is Ulf going to wake up and see what is really going on? The decisions being made are in key areas and are purely political. In the long term this kind of crap will kill the company.

Here are some specific cases where talent was eliminated as the individuals were deemed to be "IPS" people needing to be replaced by Wonderware. There were 2 individuals that single-handedly did all of the IPS rebranding. One guy did solo what Wonderware Studios takes an entire team to do. The other guy built the IPS websites and helped us in Invensys corporate with our web projects as well. He alone did what Wonderware has a team in place to do. OK, I get it, they were redundant with Wonderware. Regardless, these talented individuals were both really needed at the Invensys corporate level. God knows we need all the help we can get with Invensys branding and websites. Has anyone really looked at the terrible Invensys internal and external websites? They are a nightmare! Compare OurInvensys to the IPS or IOM intranets that are actually usable. Invensys desperately needed these talents. Now we are stuck with a crappy website and I have to outsource newsletters that could have been done internally. Those guys helped everyone in the organization and did not see IOM / Invensys boundary lines. They helped everyone as "one company" and will be missed. Losing talent that was needed elsewhere is clearly a failure of senior leadership as well as HR.

Sunday, May 9, 2010

Ulf turned Controls around? You've got to be kidding me. Controls has been turned around by Mark B, despite Ulf who has been busy destroying value in IOM and Rail.

Friday, May 7, 2010

Don't give Ulf too much credit for the Controls turnaround. If he had his way, we would have sold it off years ago. Ulf's days have passed, and Invensys needs new leadership. Someone younger, more driven, more passionate. Maybe an ex-GE person with good ops + strategy + execution skillls.

Monday, May 3, 2010

With all the gloom and doom from the people who write on this weblog, one would not expect that Ulf has been able to turn around Invensys Controls Europe during the past fiscal year. The business will report a 5.3% ROS for 2010, up from a net loss position in 2009. Not bad for a business that supplies controls to the HVAC and appliance industries, whose shipments are down 30% since 2007. Stop complaining and look in the mirror.

Saturday, May 1, 2010 - to many dear friends:

Don't worry, there is a life after Invensys. I was fired a couple of months ago, and found another job in better company. By the way, I remember all good workers and technicians spending time and effort, while managers and VPs doing anything to ruins this...

I did not visit this Weblog for a while now. So, reading some past posts I found this: did you see that "Sudipta" is an anagram from (or to) "Stupida" Yet another good choice for a project name...

Hey another thoughts: Ulf Henriksson is onboard since 2005, so 5 years of good choice and excellent management style. Well hope his birthday cake will be as big as the results - employees mood I mean! Not easy to put 5 candles on a cookie! Have safe trip guys!

Friday, April 30, 2010

Where on earth did the previous writer come up with the belief that Skelta is a 'good brand name'? It is/was a dying company that sold itself for bargain basement price. Good brand names don't do that.

Friday, April 30, 2010

Invensys has the history of ruining good brand names. Hopefully Skelta doesnt fall in that category. I dont really see a connect between comparing Skelta and Cognizant in the recent posts. The acquisition is more related to a strategic (!) solutions perspective (the same old story of sensor to board room with Baan acquisition). For a company like Invensys wanting to rebrand as a solutions company, products come in as second priority.

Friday, April 30, 2010 - RE: Moving IDC to Cognizant ODC to get rid of incompetancy:

We (good performers from Cognizant) do not agree to this statement either. It is close to one year; even now we are forced to see and deal with the same crap every day (incompetent PMs, Dev Managers, SM and Directors). Not sure when this crap will be cleared from the organization. Wish it would be very soon; otherwise we have no option left other than leaving Cognizant. It is good that the market is booming now.

Thursday, April 29, 2010 - RE: Moving IDC to Cognizant ODC is to get rid of incompetancy:

Should this happen, I would be the first person to congratulate the Invensys management. But we (employees at Invensys) are still dealing with the same incompetancy at Cognizant. Invensys would need an extended arm (which is Skelta) to get rid of the Cognizant ODC's incompetancy.

Monday, April 26, 2010

The work given to ODC by Invensys will become 50% after the Skelta acquisition. People in ODC with MS technologies have to look somewhere else. All MS projects at ODC will be slowly scrapped. It will be a tough time for people working at ODC.

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Moving IDC to Cognizant ODC is to get rid of incompetancy. I dont think there should now be a "Strategy" to get rid of ODC. They can simply ask to ramp down on teams, and treat Cognizant as yet another vendor.

Friday, April 23, 2010

The $3 million acquisition cost is merely the start. The cost of assimilating the acquisition, of creating new - and non-marketable - applications, and of attempting to train DCS sales guys to sell BPM, will make that acquisition cost seem like nothing. It is the start of another money pit.

Sudipta seems to be trying to get back the luster he had when he bought Light Hammer while at SAP for the shop floor to top floor story there. Can one honestly compare an SAP sales person to an Invensys sales person? An other possible interpretation of this acquisition is that since it was small in scope, the intent is still to keep the coffers full for a potential acquirer for Invensys itself, so as not to burden the future acquirer with something larger and more complex.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

$ 3 million for this company and you guys are worried about it? Wow! Where was everyone when they bought and sold Baan?

Thursday, April 22, 2010

The recent aquisition of Skelta could be a strategic move to check ODC at Cognizant, at least the groups which work on MS technologies. Invensys must use this aquisition to get rid of the incompetence at ODC.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Not a suprise on the topic of aquisition. No, its not because it's an Indian company; that would be too... well too much to say. But it is because the company has aspirations too big for itself without a channel or structure to support it. I have seen other companies (like Redhill and others) grow this way, but the current management seems to not understand that they will only kill any aquistion by starving it under the bottom-line orientated, non-strategic board. Who can blame the board? This would be a bad invesment. When will the rest of us shareholders take a stand and send these guys on their way?

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

CTS can now start thinking of acquiring 130 employees of Skelta under it umbrella. What shall we name this program? RE-EDGE?

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Invensys goes bottom fishing today:
http://www.invensys.com/media/default.asp?top_nav_id=3&nav_id=3&action=detail&content_no_id=874

Paid GBP 2M ($3M) for a company in an crowded market, where Microsoft effectively gives away software for free. Worse, Invensys gets all the cost and overhead of another 120 employees, and a product that no one at Invensys knows how to sell. What a surprise that it was an Indian company; imagine how that could happen. Another smart move from the Bhatyachara brains trust.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Looks like Invensys bought another Company today to become part of their Ecosystem offerings. Rumor is Honeywell & Emerson are having a party, since this will add to the confusion Sudipta has created with the Invensys market strategy. Turnover was about 2 million, so hopefully they didn't spend over 6 to buy it. Last acquisition was a 15 million dollar company bought for 52 million and best estimates still doing 15 million and not integrated into the sales channel. Difference is the new acquisition is in India not the States.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Is anyone (other than the writer) aware that Invensys' fiscal-year 2010 has ended?

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

I have heard from sources that Invensys Controls had a very good year in 2010 beating all expectations. Can anybody confirm that?

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Let's all accept that InFusion is a joke, and that if we want to compete we will need to create some real integration between the IOM product families and build a compelling solution that delivers what customers really want. We need to dump the albatross known as Archestra and the leadership that has foisted this crap upon us for years. Pankaj has had his chance, and he failed. It is time to move on. We have spent far, far too many engineering hours in the wrong areas and on a bad architecture that was poorly implemented. That is three strikes for the leadership, in my book.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

I have to agree with the inward focus comments. Becoming Invensys, One by Six, IPS, IOM, and many others... slogans and logos... hire, fire, re-organize. How about some slick integration that actually works and that isn't tested on customers? Managing sales so that customer expectations aren't out of line with actual capabilities thus not only protecting Invensys but also the customer. And what about being in a marketplace and not floundering on some pie-in-the-sky consulting marketplace. Invensys (IOM)is an automation provider meaning both Hardware and Software. You can't outsource both and expect to be a "consultant". Customers (plant managers) see right through that. They want the nuts and bolts and they want them to work. Simple as that.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Customer focus? Invensys is a trading company. Yes, just a business trading company engaged in buying and selling manufacturing companies. It can only look for profits; so there is no customer focus.

Monday, April 12, 2010

I am seeing a common thread here - a lack of focus on the customer, and more focus on internal politics and financial performance. That is not a sign of a healthy company. Also, customer focus does not imply listening to your handful of large customers. It means having a pulse on the overall market and customer base, a continuing and constant dialog, and a measure of the value you are actually delivering to your customers' businesses. I see none of that. The storm clouds are circling.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

More comments regarding the post-Sudipta era:

• A number of very good people were forced out by the new regime
• The 'executive' team was packed with incompetent friends of Sudipta with very questionable qualifications for their roles
• The effective use of offshore resources was completely bungled
• A significant amount of customer goodwill has been lost
• The culture of Wonderware has been all but destroyed
• One 'book of the day'-driven initiative after another has been foist upon the company based on what Sudipta last read rather than a fact-based analysis of the real situations
• Criticism has been all but silenced
• Channel energy is at or near an all time low

Friday, April 9, 2010

Not trying to negative but, besides the increase in Invensys stock price, here is what I have seen since Sudipta took over:

1. Spent 52 million for SAT. They are producing the same revenue almost 2 years later.
2. Having multiple sales channels providing confusion to the customer's.
3. No real new product development in either Wonderware offerings or Infusion.
4. Strategic account group filled with average sales folks with no strategy on how to leverage the various channels to provide value
5. Confusion thru the whole ecosystem( to use their word) no real executable strategy. WW channel and IOM direct are in a competitive situation with no trust, hence no growth will be seen.

Friday, April 9, 2010

Regarding the ecosystem program: Do you think it is a coincidence that one of Sudipta's long time buddies is now running it? Not. Though I must agree I think the new ecosystem programs being proposed were not the right ones for us. They should listen to customers and find out what THEY want out of an ecosystem.

Friday, April 9, 2010

Why doesn't Invensys get back to the Wonderware distributer's way of treating customer's with respect and realizing that customer's pay their salaries. Heard the departed ecosystem head was hand picked by Sudipta from a competitor who was losing market share. Great pick Sudipta! Next time around, hire someone that understands sales and customer relationships. It is real simple: develop and deliver value based products that solve customer problems, and then customer's will buy. Then you have a customer for life. If Invensys spent the time with customer's that they spend in internal meetings to stroke each other's ego, they would be better off. My 2 cents.

Friday, April 9, 2010

Speaking as a long-standing Wonderware ecosystem member, the departure of the head of the group is probably for the best. His proposed changes to the program (incredibly high annual fees with no identifiable ROI potential for the partners, non-value-adding reporting requirements, quotas, etc.) have alienated heretofore loyal and committed partners.

Plus, the never ending game of musical chairs within the group has stalled all forward progress towards redefining the program. The program is both in limbo AND a state of flux. Hard to achieve...

Friday, April 9, 2010

WonderWare is, for all intents and purposes, dead as we once knew it. It was well on its way, when Pankaj and his crew took over the reins and the white elephants known as Archestra and InFusion sucked in all of the available oxygen in the company.

Looking from the top, Ulf is a terrible leader for a company in this mode. He is good at cleaning up financial messes, but does not have a strategic bone in his body. He has created a chaotic organizational structure that defies coherence in every way, and creates unhealthy competition that does not bring one single customer benefit. The moment an organization loses its focus on the customer and turns inwards, the end has begun. Invensys will certainly be parceled out or gobbled up in the reasonably near future.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

How is it ever going to be possible for each region to do anything autonomously? Product comes from the central organisation. Product is what we sell. All the powerpoints in the world will only sell vapourware for a short period of time. So far we have yet to see a single thing from the regions HQ - other than "how much will you book next month?"

Look at Wonderware's core products - development has stopped apart from bug fixes, and even then the development group seems incapable of merging the many bug fixes into a release version. And as for QA - Let's test it for the bugs we know about. Let the customer find the rest!

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

IOM organizational structure changes ongoing. The sales regions have P&L and the corporate folks are a cost center only. With all marketing, OEM business development, industry initiatives, product management, and ecosystem development under this structure it has been pointed out that the corporate strategy lacks teeth because each region is autonomous and will take whatever strategy of investment and development regardless of the corporate public relations and talk of strategy to the market. Not sure how this will work, but its one of the reasons you wont find a consistent strategy or customer experience globally. Tough to do in any company, but this kind of organizational structure seems to make it more of a challenge. A regional approach makes sense but there still has to be a global strategy that VPs sign up for.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010 - Response to March 31, 2010 weblog by "little facts and nothing but opinions":

You are assuming that if one or several of us goes to management and talks about our concerns, that management will take appropriate steps. Well, if it was a company with good management personnel, these problems wouldn't have occurred in the first place!

You probably are (bad) management material or haven't worked for any of the companies on this weblog. Everything is an opinion; why else do we call them opinion polls? This weblog does discuss industry; the posters are stating why their companies are not doing well, and it is mainly boiling down to the root problem which is inefficient, inactive, inbred management.

Many have left or been laid off from these companies. However, there are many that still work in these companies and are watching their jobs disappear, careers coming to an end prematurely, or just plainly suffering with no end in sight.

If corporations claim they are existing as an organism, and trying to be "green" and environmentally-friendly, then they should have ethics too. Corporations are always lobbying congress and "buying" votes at every political level. That's just plain proof of government for sale. No wonder our American jobs have gone overseas. Even defense contractors are taking federal money to ship jobs to Puerto Rico.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

The ultimate power struggle at IOM is taking shape and will be full of fireworks soon. Ulf's previous hand-picked choice (Sudipta) and his all-show-no-substance pals against Ulf's most recent hand-picked choice (Teemu) and his back-to-the-future/mini ABB approach. Place your bets and form your alliances, ladies and gentlemen. This should be exciting. Be sure you have a good seat!

Monday, April 5, 2010

One blogger asked to have something real to say around the company. Well take this into consideration the next time making a major committment to a company for standardization. Take a good look at the bench within a company and the resources behind it. Right now as all companies are stretched thin, its even more important. Industry initiatives such as Corporate Engergy Management, Transportation, Asset Management, and even new Apps in Oil and Gas have small players behind them and lack the real global resources to take major or global. This company seems to be pushing the envelope of profitability while forsaking its future as a provider that has the legs to take it much further, or ownership that a customer would want. Be sure the contract is tight when dealing with large scale purchases. Where is the investment beyond fixes and support its own products Are its customers happy now with the changes or will they be in the future? Only sales and not profitability will tell on that front; and for all the others in the automation business. Something to consider.

Saturday, April 3, 2010 - Re: Eliminating onsite coordinators from CTS.

The bigger problem with Cognizant ODC and Invensys are that they are actively considering many good steps, but are unable or unwilling to implement any of them. Instead only bad measures are implemented and the responsibility for doing anything good is shrugged off by management and passed right down to the base level. If management can't take responsibilities and face the consequences of their decisions, why the hell are such cowards leading these organizations?

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

As I read this weblog, it makes me wonder why it is here. I think it is just putting out crap on all the automation companies; for what? Come on, is Invensys, Honeywell or Rockwell, or any other company really that bad? Wow! There are little facts and nothing but opinions. It's a joke to see such garbage by so-called professionals. What ever happened to discussion on product or solutions? Let's discuss industry or economy impacts to our businesses!

If you read this think about it. If you have a issue with Invensys or any other company, be a professional and address it within the company, or leave!

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

The scummy internal politics continue. We lost a good guy at IOM who was handling our ecosystem - who got kicked out. I guess the ecosystem isn't important anymore, or you need to be a friend/bootlicker of the boss. This place sucks and I can't wait to find something else.

Saturday, March 27, 2010

Invensys Rail Group is now also nosediving into terminal decline. The power-crazed directors and managers across all of the business units are in a turf-war for control and R&D is more about who has the most power, not who delivers good products. Their ineffectual leader in HQ is too busy collecting air-miles to notice what is really going on. The products being developed are already out of date and we are struggling to catch up with the competition. We are screwed. Time to brush up your CV's.

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Great News: Invensys is actively considering to get rid of the onsite coordinators from CTS. Might be the postings here that prompted the Invensys Management to reevaluate their positions. Invensys should post people with good product knowledge at Invensys ODC Hyderabad to help the Dev and QA teams to understand the requirements better.

Saturday, March 20, 2010 - To "Complain, Complain" and "Working, not whining":

I see you don't put your names or email here, either. If you want to post something that shows who you are and how to reach you, you might get some details. But if all you're doing is chiding the rest of us from the safety of your own anonymity, you have no credibility. Come on: if you are saying that people should speak up and you're touting the company line, you of all people have nothing to fear, right? Put a little skin in the game.

Friday, March 19, 2010 - from former 30+ year employee:

I for one am quite pleased to be away from the nonsense that Invensys has become. For the last five years of my career I could feel the sense of hopelessness engulf me as I walked from my car to the entrance of my building. I don't miss that one bit.

Friday, March 19, 2010

Excellent writeup, Jim. I particularly found your treatment of Peter Martin's appearance at ARC quite poignant. He is a brilliant man, but sadly, has been parked on the sidelines for years now. He did his best to fill in the (many) blanks in the IOM strategy with the vision of a real-time business that he has held for nearly a decade, but the overall message remained muddled.

No, this Phoenix will not rise from the ashes, as one of the press suggested, but rather, will end up as the turkey dinner on some acquirers table in the not so distant future. Henrikkson lacks the skills for a company at this juncture, Bhatychara is in over his head, and the team they have assembled is weak through and through. The leadership team lacks in vision and execution, and that is not a formula for success.

Friday, March 19, 2010

Invensys IOM strategy is flawed

What's the IOM strategy? Knowledgeable industry pundits like Andrew Bond (Automation Insider) and editors Gary Mintchell and Walt Boyes have tried to explain it. I suspect they are simply parroting the press-releases, with the "emperor's clothes" syndrome. Privately most admit that it has little chance of success. Hey, I can't explain it. If you can understand it, "You're a better man than I am Gunga Din"!

Apparently, Ulf drank the cool-aid, and is probably getting ready to jump ship.

(Click) Read the analysis on JimPinto.com eNews 19 March 2010.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

If Invensys starts shuttering offices in the UK, it most certainly portends the transfer of HQ to the USA.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Lots of noise that Invensys are considering / are shutting down some of their UK offices and relocating the work back to Paris - is anybody able to confirm this and if so which offices?

Sunday, March 14, 2010 - To the person asking for specifics:

There are lots of specifics, and gross violations of ethics, though this anonymous weblog is not the place to expose them. Those silly online ethics courses talked about how the appearance of an ethical violation is just as bad, but it is all do-what-I-say and not do-what-I-do here.

If any of this is true and a director has been covering for illegal acts, then it all becomes a federal felony and the SEC moves in. If someone reports it to the IRS for the hefty rewards they give for reporting tax cheats, there can be an IRS investigation, too. They can even gather the information without a warrant as part of an ongoing tax investigation and then turn over evidence of crimes to the SEC.

There is much could be done better here. Still, I like working here because of the products and many of the great people. I would like it better if the company ran cleaner and did all the ethical things they should. This is one of the typical problems with how things are run badly here.

Saturday, March 13, 2010 - RE: You should be WORKING, not whining on this Weblog:

The comment was "We all in Invensys ODC can access this site." and this does not mean that "We all in Invensys ODC do access this site." Nor does it mean "We all in Invensys ODC always access this site." Nor does it mean that "We all in Invensys ODC access this site from office network."

The person asking us to be "WORKING" assumed all the above illogical conditions. The worst thing is that he may be from ODC or Cognizant management, and this really worries us because in this case we are forced to ask ourselves that why are we working for such fools?

On the Other hand this guy can be one of the Invensys US guys preaching to us. In this case we wonder what happened to US intelligentsia? Have they all left Invensys already? Or are they so pissed that they don't want to represent their organization on this blog and so let the underprivileged talk instead!

Saturday, March 13, 2010 - Re: "We all in Invensys ODC can access this site.":

There is part of the root of the problem. You should be WORKING, not whining on this Weblog.

Friday, March 12, 2010

Complain, Complain: Why not actual information? What are the leaders doing wrong? What policies, actions, decisions do you disagree with? What should change? Name names, speak the truth, but please stop whining. Most of these posta look like they are from low-level people with no real clue to what is going on in the buisness, but are pissed off that they don't get more for themselves.

Friday, March 12, 2010 - Re: Wobbly heads and brown noses:

For my Indian colleague, the term "brown nose" has got nothing to do with the brown color of the skin. It has a very different connotation than you think, with NO cultural, regional, or racial significance. It is offensive only to the individual who places his nose in such a way as to potential get something brown upon it.

Here's the Answers.com definition of "brownnose":

To support slavishly every opinion or suggestion of a superior: bootlick, cringe, fawn, grovel, kowtow, slaver. Informal apple-polish, cotton. Slang suck up. Idioms: curry favor, dance attendance, kiss someone's feet, lick someone's boots.

Thursday, March 11, 2010 - Re: Wobbly heads and brown noses:

Please don't use remarks that hurt sentiments of a community/gender/race etc. If some one, or a group of people are incompetent, say it loud. People who fall under same group support your argument professionally. For example, Sudipta being Indian-born doesn't automatically get support from all Indian-born in Invensys. In fact >90% may not like him, as like in any other groups. I request you to criticize people based on thier actions, not on any other criteria.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Invensys has got all its prioities mixed up and messed up. You look at any of the geographical regions and you have individuals ruining the organization with their own notions of how to run a company.

And there are a whole bunch of freeloaders with wobbly heads which go up and down in agreement whenever the boss says something, and they get promoted. Needless to say these freeloaders would not know the difference between Foxboro and Triconex and Wonderware, but would still decide how these should be sold and serviced.

Man, it's a crazy orzanization, with brown nosers getting promoted and good guys being thrown out. You can even go so far as to say that all the guys at the top now are pretty much there because they have wobbly heads and brown noses. I know of one brown noser who has hardly ever seen the inside of any customer's office and has seen business deteriorate under his stewardship; but his wobbly head keeps him afloat and even gives him promotions.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

I am interested to know how the Middle East operation can be streamlined. There's a whole bunch of major projects happening out there and we seem to lag way behind the competition.

Thursday, March 11, 2010

The CEO of IOM communicated that the global sales operations leadership function would be disbursed among a variety of other VP’s within the organization, Finance and Portfolio taking on most of the functionality. I addition,Sudipta communicated that he would be going outside of the company to hire a leader that understood “Value Selling”. Apparently he doesn’t think any of the sales leadership in this company understands Value-Selling and hence he needs to go outside and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to hire someone that can teach the sales organization how to sell.

Sort of reminds me of the last Global VP of Sales at IPS, when he told the global sales organization they were all incompetent. This is coming from a guy that has been in supply-chain his entire career. I’d like to know what Sudipta agreed to buy from any partner in his career that was based on “Value Selling”. In typical fashion we will have to wait another 18 months for Sudipta to get his package and depart the organization, only to have another leader come in to the business to tell everyone they have no clue what they are doing. At some point we need to wake up and see, it isn’t that the employees do not what they are doing. It is the leader that doesn’t know.

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

We all in Invensys ODC can access this site.

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Hey, does anyone else have trouble accessing this Invensys weblog site from within the company network? Hmm.....

Friday, February 26, 2010

Yes, Pankaj's impact on Wonderware and its brand goes back many, many years, but realize that he has had joint development responsibility for the former Simsci and Foxboro now for a couple of years as well. His biggest failings were in expending massive amounts of money and resource on that white elephant known as Archestra, which was obsolete and underdesigned almost from its inception. A reasonable ROI on those investments will never be realized. It is not possible. He also failed to recognize the importance of adjacent areas beyond HMI and control and did everything he could to suppress progress - and people - in those areas. It pains me to think what he has done to us on the MES team.

He does not deal well with those who do not agree with his world view. The net result is that the combined IOM remains mostly the same company with the same solution set it had 10 or 15 years ago, with only a few small exceptions. Quite depressing, actually, since we seemt to have no shortage of ideas and talent.

Sudipta has some good plans and understands what customers need now and moving ahead. He has shown a willingness to listen and to refine his views based on our input. Now he only needs to jettison one of the key weights holding him back. If he does this, we all need to get behind him 110% to show our support.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Most of the people who blame Pankaj are Wonderware folks. SimSci and Foxboro had gone through the pains of re-organization well before Pankaj and Sudipta were in charge of the place. Pankaj hadn't allowed it to happen as non-executive manager. He is no longer able to that anymore. Funniest thing is, those who protected them all these years are getting blamed for actions (retrenchments in Wonderware) he isn't taking. Cognizant is handpicked by Ulf and the Board; blaming Sudipta or Pankaj will not help.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

I would also be glad to see Sudipta succeed. I have many doubts that he can do it if he cannot see the continuing damage that Pankaj and his pets have done to the people and products here at Wonderware.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

What exactly has Pankaj done? Who has he driven out? Greater details will help us assess the value of these comments. It sounds like a bit of whining. But maybe there is truth as well.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

+1 on giving Sudipta a chance if he can show leadership by making a change in development. I hope and pray every day that I see that e-mail announcement come through in my inbox. There will be dancing in the hall ways! Followed by new found energy, excitement and hard work.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Regarding executive changes, personally, I would like to give Sudipta a chance. At least he has some modern ideas and seems passionate about growing IOM. As for Pankaj, I have no such patience. His time has come and gone, and he forced out some people who could have really made things better. The real test for Sudipta is whether he has the leadership to make this change and if he can do it before irreparable damage is done. If he doesn't act soon, he will lose support from many of us.

Tuesday, February 23, 2010 - RE: Most of the Project Managers at IDC/ODC are good in people management only.

Small corrections needed:

1. They are neither good at people management nor at project management. We (Invensys) realized this at last, and started doing project management from the US.
2. They (Project Managers) cannot clear even a single simple technical doubt: Nay, project managers need not but Dev. managers and leads should be able to. We have now realized that some of the Dev. managers and leads at ODC cannot do this even. Consequently, it is best to do the dev. management from Invensys

Monday, February 22, 2010

I don't know any of the names being mentioned/blamed in recent posts. I left Foxboro almost ten years ago. The death spiral started then or even before then. They had a world beater product... the 200 Series I/A DIN rail mounted I/O. It had everyone else beat by years. Engineering did its job, but someone in the upper echelon took a dislike to the head honcho involved in its creation and drove him out of the company and sabatoged the product launch. I didn't like him too much myself, but he delivered what should have put Delta V out of business.

Monday, February 22, 2010 - RE: "The Invensys board and senior executives, acting in the best interests of shareholders, should do what is right":

Does any one believe that Invensys senior executives have the vision to do what is right? From couple of years this big question is lingering in the brains of every employee of Invensys.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Most of the Project Managers at IDC/ODC are good in people management only. They cannot clear even a single simple technical doubt. They come to office to enjoy tea with puff and then start ICICI direct at 10:00AM. According to them a project manager should be able to handle the project, technical skill are not necessary. IDC/ODC needs technical managers, not project managers. They neither manage a project nor help people technically. Most of them are ethernet cards without MAC address.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Stan, while I respect your attempt to find something positive, the reality is that perhaps the only way to get rid of the aptly described "toxic management" is to see a downturn in business as customers question the viability and direction. There sure doesn't seem to be any other way. We are collectively powerless, as this is no democracy, nor should it be. What should happen, however, is that the Invensys board and senior executives, acting in the best interests of shareholders, should do what is right and make the necessary changes.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Stan, I also couldn't agree more. Having left Invensys several years ago, the only reason I read this weblog is to reassure myself that I made the right decision. Invensys had the opportunity of becoming the Global Automation leader with Brands such as Foxboro I/A or M&I, Triconex, Wonderware & others. Instead, I don't think they even rank in the top 5 anymore. It is really a shame that the senior managers could not have this vision and put good people in place that understood what needed to be done to achieve this.

Look at the top management at Yokogawa, Honeywell, Emerson, Rockwell etc. etc. and you will find excellent people who left in disgust, or were driven out by incompetence. I myself would consider returning and have been approached on numerous occasions to do so. Unfortunately, Invensys is not a healthy company, nor do they supply a healthy environment to work in. The passion that we all had for the products and services produced by Invensys has left. This weblog enables those who really care to vent. I truly hope that management does read these posts and figures out that their most valuable resource is the passion that their people have for this company. If they don't, Invensys will surely cease to exist.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

When I first discovered this blog, it made me feel a lot better because I realized I was not the only person seeing these things. It has also been good for comparing notes. The halls are not a good place to start a conversation like "Do you think Pankaj is a complete idiot or has he shown signs of consciousness?" for anyone who doesn't want to be unemployed soon.

I hope that news of the low esteem Pankaj is held in will filter up to someone who cares and also has a spine and that he will be put under close examination. I don't think it's likely, but I am hopeful that there is still someone competent in management who recognizes a true pointy-haired boss when he sees one.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Stan, this is a very good post. Too much negativity only breeds more negativity, it is true. But it is also true that there is no fixing most of these people. They have no reason to change. When you have incompetent directors covering up for their favorite managers and incompetent VPs covering up for their favorite directors, it only makes for a toxic work place. Having an art show is a fine idea which is worth trying, but it is also only rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

What keeps me here is that it is better than being unemployed while I look for another job elsewhere. I keep my head down and avoid the worst of them, but it is hard to be motivated when the beatings keep coming and people who have been there longer but aren't doing a good job get rewards and recognition.

Saturday, February 20, 2010 - Stan Abbot [sjabbot@juno.com]:

I'm a former long-term Invensys employee and had my own set of problems with the way things were done ... but ... is the stuff in this blog really helping anyone or making a difference? Do you folks really feel better after reading it?

• The management probably no longer looks at it (if they ever did).
• If customers look at it, they probably seriously consider no longer being customers.
• Having a place to air/discuss issues and pass information is a good thing ... but this blog contains pretty much only griping and grumbling and gloom.

How about looking to make a change in the areas that YOU can affect, as in "Think globally; act locally." Why not get together informally over coffee (or chai), agree on some basic issue statements (an important concept), and brainstorm some new and creative ideas for effecting change? The issues can be related to business but don't have to be e.g. "How can we put together an employee art show?" The feeling of having an effect, allbeit locally, will be uplifting.

And try to find some things that the company did RIGHT so you can pass along a word of encouragement.

Friday, February 19, 2010

People also throw stones at hornet's nests, stray dogs that look like they might bite without provocation, and bullies. Use enought stones and you can knock down the hornet's nest, chase the stray dog away, and convince the bully that there are painful consequences to bullying. IOM management is all three of these, but not a tree with fruit.

Friday, February 19, 2010

Now the Middle East region is running wihtout TSC nor MD - An organization of Delivery and 7 CSE's!

Thursday, February 18, 2010

There is an exodus from Invensys Middle East. The new President who comes from a consumer electronics background is firing people left, right and centre i.e. anybody who disagrees with him. Of the ones that are left there is a steady stream of resignations. The installed base will pull along the organization for a while but the future is absolutely bleak.

Thursday, February 18, 2010

No one throws stones at trees which have no fruits. Everyone throw stones at trees with fruits.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

I do not know why people are writing such nonsense in these blogs. Such situations are happening everyday, everywhere and in every company in the world. Please stop such announcements. It is a fact that that any company does not see people productive, efficient and then definietly it has to rotate responsibilities. People migh see it as bad, but others would see it good for the company.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010 - Re: Any American drop out can ...

That's an honest confession. If college drop out can do, and if it costs more in America, why in America? Are we going towards socialism, protectionism blah blah. We Americans are the ones who wanted the free market world, which is helping our companies selling goods all over the world, bringing money into our economy.

Truthfully if we get right full share proportion to the market we have in America, that's good demand. What I mean is, if Invensys does 30% of it's total business out of America we should have 30% of the jobs. I think we do. If we want greater than our market share, then we are demanding jobs from other geographies. Will you support if a UK national rises to say that Invensys a British company should hire more of them than any one else?

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

So if we all generally seem to agree that Pankaj is the bottleneck for progress, why does not Sudipta agree? At some point, the buddy-factor needs to be overridden by personal survival, which we hope is soon. Sudipta probably thinks he gets honest feedback from low level employees, when in fact everyone is scared to death of telling the truth for fear of dismissal.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

The work which gets from Invensys to either IDC/ODC is just manual work. Even any American college dropout can perform this type of work without any problem. But in America they are paid $ 5000 a month; in India it is peanuts. Much of the development work and important CR/CAR's are fixed at Invensys; only junk CR's are sent to ODC. Any new product to be released first time in the market, is tested at America only. Testing in India will be carried out with subsequent release only.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

It seems silly that Sudipta would have to protect his 'vision' against an Indian mafia. He is the head of the Indian mafia and all his little favorite people are Indian too. And if the best he can do is someone like Pankaj, then it is hardly a vision worth supporting.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

News is that potential candidates (internal and external) to succeed Ulf are currently being vetted, with the heads of IOM and IRL under serious consideration.

Saturday, February 13, 2010 - Re: Americans developed process automation software....

No one is contradicting the fact that America had produced lot of innovation in 20th century. What we are talking is current scenario, not past glory. Arabs can also say when world was still battling for food they invented the number system which is foundation of modern day science (number system which we use today), Advancement of humanity happened in Africa, University system first developed in India. In fact Columbus discovered America while trying to get to India (that time, entire Europe wanted to trade with India).

Leave about the past glory; India is a third world developing country in reality, and that's the fact. However it nutures ambitions to prove itself, and having met great success in areas like IT, Steel etc. No one contradicts 19th century was Europe's, 20th century was America's, 21st century is definitely for Asia... and continues... Who knows 22nd century could be Africa/Latin America's.

Let us discuss current issues, or else let us go to the days of evolution where Africa is the place where first steps of human advancement happened which is basis for every thing we enjoy today.

Saturday, February 13, 2010 - RE: when they were kids in the school, Americans have developed Process Automation software and hardware.

Hey, my American friend, don't teach (talk) history. Be reasonable by speaking about the present and future. We (Americans) have our own (few hundred years old) and they have their own (few thousand years old) histories. Trust, it is our corporates greediness which is driving the jobs way from US.

Saturday, February 13, 2010 - RE: People at IDC, all biz-units, must realize...

My friend, IDC is past, ODC is present. Correct yourself first. Then don't brood over the past and be sensible in understanding the current scenario. If you have the guts, go and convince Invensys management that you don't need ODCs. We welcome and wish you "All the best"

Saturday, February 13, 2010 - RE: It is close to $3M.

Shame on IOM management to waste company's money like this. Invensys can post their own people at ODC DLF Hyderabad,who can definitely do a better job than the worthless onsite coordinators of Cognizant. Sure, this can cost us (Invensys) much less, ~$1M.

Saturday, February 13, 2010 - Re: Why are MBAs without any domain and product knowledge working as Onsite coordinators?

You should ask IOM development head why he needed MBAs/non-domains in development organization. During IDC days same management was very strict on domain experience. May be these management people are bought by Cognizant

Saturday, February 13, 2010

People at IDC, all biz-units, must realize that when they were kids in the school, Americans have developed Process Automation software and hardware. They should should know this, and then they should talk about theselves. They are dependant on Invensys not vice versa.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

The role of the "onsite coordinator" would be a living hell. Imagine being ten thousand miles from home, teaching someone else everything you know, so that they can steal your job and that of your neighbors. No thanks.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Why are MBAs without any domain and product knowledge working as Onsite coordinators? They are both ineffective and way too goofy. I wonder if we can pick some experienced guys from India ODC or Invensys USA for this job. If we cannot, it would be better to drop these positions, as we can easily do better without them.

Friday, February 12, 2010 - Re: Sorry to say, but Sudipta does not have the backbone:

It isn't about backbone; it is about protecting the individuals that support his vision. He needs all the friends he can find at IOM. The India mafia has taken over IOM; you don't have to be talented, you just need to be from the right part of the world.

Friday, February 12, 2010 - RE: It is a well known fact that Invensys management is wasting our hard earned money by keeping the useless onsite coordinators of Cognizant:

This is true to a large extent; guess what could be the order of our hard earned dollars getting wasted on these coordinators? It is close to $3M. What a shameless management we have at Invensys

Thursday, February 11, 2010 - RE: In fact we need to post some good people of Invensys at ODC DLF Hyderabad:

Yes, most of us at ODC fully agree with this suggestion. Invensys representatives who can guide us from requirements perspective and willing to be located at ODC are most wanted and welcomed than these useless onsite coordinators of Cognizant. In fact this was the original proposal per Invensys management at the time of transition. God knows what transpired afterwards, we got these onsite coordinators.

Thursday, February 11, 2010 - RE: Sorry to say, but Sudipta does not have the backbone:

Do not expect anything like this, both of them are holding their hands together. Moreover, Invensys can not expect the talent better than this at this juncture. Bear the burden or part away, at least others can enjoy

Wednesday, February 10, 2010 - RE: O(I)DC managers to look for new jobs:

Yes bosses from Cognizant and/or Invensys, we are ready for the show, be prepared to face the challenge after our exit. Most of us are ready to get out of this sickening place and management attitude.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Sorry to say, but Sudipta does not have the backbone to fire the head of development, even though he knows it is the right thing to do. It will be more of the same for years to come until Ulf or someone else sees the light and forces his hand.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010 - RE: VP of Development to be released from his role:

Why just VP of Development? Our organization has many more heads like this. Do not expect any help from Sudipta either, he is busy in planning for another mess. Only right minded people, if any remain in Invensys, need to get-together quickly and throw these useless people and their strategies out of the company before it sinks in total.

Tuesday, February 9, 2010 - RE: ex-IDC managers:

Yes, it is a known secrete that few of the managers are like this, from IDC days. When this was pointed out even by Invensys US management, no action was taken against them. Not confident that either Cognizant will correct this type of issues as their on-site coordinators are much worse than these managers. It is a well known fact that Invensys management is wasting our hard earned money by keeping them onsite.

In fact we need to post some good people of Invensys at ODC DLF Hyderabad who can help the teams there on a regular basis and eliminate these worthless onsite coordinators of Cognizant. This would be a win-win strategy for both Cognizant and Invensys. Sudipta/Pankaj takeup this matter on war-footing and atleast this could help you to succeed in this endeavor.

Monday, February 8, 2010

Now I think it is right time for ex-IDC managers to look for new jobs. Most of the managers are not even aware of the product for which their group members sent abroad for training. It is very easy for team members to fool their managers and still it is very easy for managers to fool their group directors. Because managers/directors are not fully conversant with knowledge.

Monday, February 8, 2010

If the IOM development group is a "mockery and a fraud", then it is a direct reflection of its leadership. It is (long past) time for the VP of Development to be released from his role, and the company can move on in a positive direction. Sudipta, please help us.

Sunday, February 7, 2010 - RE: "Was shocked and surprised at a couple of the so-called "executives" Bhattacharya has brought in."

Sudipta offered the APAC chief position to this person in recognition to his services for Invensys-Cognizant deal (this person is consultant to Cognizant for the project EDGE) and to execute next one (moving the Invensys engineering groups to another OSP/Cognizant)

Friday, February 5, 2010

Few days back, the only managing director who achieved his target in IOM Middle East was fired, without mentionning a single reason. I hope the top management is still enjoying the Middle East collapse. Congratulations to all competitors.

Thursday, February 4, 2010

The IOM development group in Invensys is a big mockery and fraud now. Rather than giving correct inputs to the teams at ODC, their focus has shifted to finding faults, to cover-up their owns. Just remember, whether you fail or make ODC fail, the loser is always going to be INVENSYS

Wednesday, February 3, 2010 - Re: "In reality, more resignations were expected from GSD based":

So you DO believe that domain knowledge is not necessary, and that developers for our systems can be picked up off the street. Good of you to clarify this for us all......

Tuesday, February 2, 2010 - Re: 'Now ODC resignations started like bombs in GSD':

In reality, more resignations were expected from GSD based on the initial reactions from these employees when this engagement was announced. But not so. These numbers can be easily dealt with.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010 - RE: Domestic vehicle quality has definitely reached parity with Japanese manufacturers.

I don't want to take sides in the fight between the American Invensys team and Indian CTS team, but then I cannot resist commenting on CARS and cannot ignore such distortion of reality.

To be honest, I don't read the news to figure out what is the quality of a car. With my experience on multiple car models from different manufacturers, both in India and US, I'll rank them as follows:

2009 Customer Satisfaction Survey by the most acknowledged business magazine: Toyota comes first and not only in cars (First globally in any manufactured product), then we have Honda, then FAW (China), then Maruti (India), then BMW, and I don't remember where the GREAT American Belly-ups are in this list.

Mileage for same engine Capacity: Toyota scores best, then Honda, then Koreans and probably then the GREAT American Belly-ups.

Reliability: Any one who studied engineering will know that the less efficient an engine, the more heat it produces and so the more is the wear and tear. So I'll leave it to you to guess the rankings.

Engine refinement, Transmission smoothness, Consistency of Pick ups and ease of handling w.r.t revving/breaking: Toyota comes first, then the Honda. GM cars (Pontiac, Malibu) have inconsistent pickups. E.g You have to really slow a Malibu down before entering a parking lot, else you will hit something. You can drive a Toyota @ 30 miles into a crowded parking lot and park just right i.e. the place you want and the way u want. This is because a Toyota behaves exactly the same every time, even during sharp turns.

Usable interior Space divided by Car Size: Honda First, then Toyota, then Koreans and then probably every one else who can make a car and then finally the great american Belly ups.

Car Companies for Share holders in Last 2 years: Maruti (India) shares multiplied 4 times, FAW shares multiplied 3 times, Toyota doubled and GM and Chrysler Shares hit Absolute Zero (a decrease by infinite times).

Regarding the news about Pedal Sticking: Do we know 1 Toyota car that had this problem?? Also a problem in 1 Toyota car doesn't make all American cars better. When the Americans come back with cars that are more efficient, reliable and refined than the Japanese, their car companies will no longer be run by the govt and the unions but by investors and capitalists.

It will take America more than Obama's charming words or a Nobel prize to get out of this mess. So lets stop meaningless blogging and start working, because the world is catch up with us and not only in cars!

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Full disclosure: I currently work for an IOM competitor. Recently I took a look at the new IOM website and happened upon the executive team listing. Was shocked and surprised at a couple of the so-called "executives" Bhattacharya has brought in. His buddy from Geometric is hardly prepared to run an operation like IOM's APAC organization, and the guy he brought in from ABB was the one responsible for its Skyva debacle. Who's minding the store there? Keep hiring these kind of "leaders"! We love it!

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Now ODC resignations started like bombs in GSD, which was exactly forecasted when edge got operated. Senior person in PRO/II resigned. Can anybody dare to think to replace or recruit such a talent? Even a lot of others are just waiting their turn to leave GSD. One side it is enjoyment for the US staff because their jobs are secure; on other side their work load will be tremendously increasing soon because the best talent is leaving very soon, from especially GSD.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

My Reply to the blog stating Cognizant is paying up to 1 Lakh (100,000 Indian rupees) monthly salary for engineers with ONLY 1 year experience:

The information you got is totally wrong. A person with 1 year experience in Cognizant is getting paid around 3.2 - 3.4 Lakhs per Annum. which is equialent to 7200 USD per year, and 590$ per month. Even in India, where living costs are less (Not really), it is enough only to fill the stomach of the employee. Nothing more.

Friday, January 29, 2010

The last blogger is clearly stuck in the 1990's. Domestic vehicle quality has definitely reached parity with Japanese manufacturers. Or don't you read the news?

Thursday, January 28, 2010

FYI. I moved to one of the developing countries and do not work for Invensys anymore. I agree with reasoning of the post - why GE? Always my argument is that there is no dearth of human intellect anywhere. I respect US as a country where lot of great innovators are available. Having said that, there are enough people capable of doing same tasks in India and elsewhere. One should understand why they are cheap: they are cheap not because of low quality, but due to the low cost of living. I have seen many instances where people moved from US work for quarter the salary that they used to command in the US. These are people who had US education and had been sucessfull for years in US industry.

Also my other argument was, why not Invensys? If the entire competetion is doing that, and if Invensys don't do, that they may not survive.

Another reason I truly believe - why there is so much backlash in IT related stuff was the reason of unmatured outsourcing in US terms. Usually US companies innovate run through it for few decades, then outsource to elsewhere. A good example was ship-building, which peaked in US later in the 80's, moved Japan and currently happens in Korea. However, as IT related stuff doesn't require much infrastructure, it moved on quickly.

Regarding Cognizant hiring at very high salaries - that could not be true. The Indian market pays around US$ 10-15k per yr for one year experience, and Cognizant is not an exception.

Boeing and GM life cycles are longer; they started their R&D 4-5 yrs back, and have yet to see the results. Every one knows why Boeing got delayed, and the delay was much before the outsourcing boom. It's because of poor PM in that org. I am wise enough not to say that the US doesn't have a good PM. GM's failure is not doing manufacturing outsourcing. While rivals like Ford source components mostly from India, and Toyata gets from Japan, GM hadn't been able to move quickly, and so they paid the price.

Someone was debating about IP. Yes that's a debatable question when you are outsourcing to a third party.

I truly believe that the success of any entity depends on how it was built and managed. How well you attracted the best talent. The same is true with IDC.

My final words - let me end by saying that people had a perception that Japanesse cars were inferior to American ones in 80's, and now the most diehard American fans cannot say that. Japanese cars are better than American cars. I understand the pain it causes while technology moves away, impacting lives. But one cannot do anything except to be sympathetic. That's the charm, or the brutality, of global free markets.

Thursday, January 28, 2010

What a terribly uninformed comment regarding Boeing. There is no better example of why NOT to outsource than the Boeing 787 example!

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Quoting names of companies doing R&D in India... Aren't Boeing years late with there 787...and haven't GM gone bankrupt?!

Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - To the person who blogged "Sunday, January 24, 2010" regarding all the "successful" companies doing R&D in India:

I'd like to Point Out that Honeywell and ABB may be currently enjoying success, but their reputations is getting as bad as their products. Microsoft is "Hit and Miss". I can't really speak of the other companies.

I'd also like to point out that the USA. was the first country to put a man on the moon, and lead the world in technology, medical research, automotive, computers, etc., long before India, China, Brazil, and other counties even had electricity, let alone modern capabilities. There are a few reasons for the decline, but without a doubt, the biggest is the offshoring of jobs. It's impossible to innovate and improve things when you no longer make things.

Lastly if you are so fond of other counties, perhaps you should go live in those countries. The USA (and for that matter Canada, UK, Australia and Japan) could do with one less person with such a defeatist attitude.

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Heard from one of my off-shore India collegue that Cognizant in India is doing a "mass" hiring in major Indian "Tech" cities like Pune, Bangalore, Hyderabad, etc. It was alleged that Cognizant is paying up to 1 Laksh (100,000 Indian rupees) monthly salary, which today is equivalent to about US$ 2,150 for engineers with ONLY 1 year experience. It is quite a fair bit of money, to have with India's low cost of living.

If this is true, then I have doubts about the recruitment process of Cognizant in such mass recruitment scale. Going by such a recruitment method, I wonder how this will affect the quality of Cognizant work for Invensys in the long run?

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

To answer "why GE?" "why XXX?", one must first analyze the behavior of corporate leadership and what drives them.

Fundamentally, many US-based and global multinationals take a quarter-to-quarter, near term view of their strategic and operational planning. This is driven by their own compensation schemes, pressures from the capital markets, and by fundamental inabilities to think on a longer-term scale. Corporations in many of the emerging markets, notably those in the Far East, operate amidst different pressures and motivations and are able to think of much longer planning horizons, even multi-generationally at times.

The outsourcing/offshoring trend was and is driven largely by this short term operational mentality. Most of these corporations are mortgaging their futures to meet near term financial targets. They are losing critical intellectual property (you don't believe for a minute that Indian outsourcers don't indirectly sell what they learn at ABB to Honeywell, do you?), operational flexibility, and are taking the easy way out, but one that fattens the bonuses of the top executives.

There are a number of fantastic oppportunities and reasons to establish a multi-dimensional presence in emerging economies. However, short term cost management is the very worst reason of all, for all participants.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

I do not comment on the efficiency of IDC. Everyone has different perceptions based on which BU you worked for. I would wish that there was no dearth of talent in India; the results depends on how you build and manage. As said, one should not bother about the comments of people getting impacted and the same holds good for IDC folks reaction few months back. It should be the business interests, not any percieved opinions.

My only question is that if the entire bashing of high value creation at low cost is true, then how come most innovations are appearing with companies that are applying the above business model. To name a few: Microsoft, Apple, Google, Yahoo, Oracle, IBM etc. FYI Boeing, LHK, GM, GE are doing most of R&D in India. Don't tell me automation software is more complicated than Aeronautics, Operating systems. Even if you convince, then the next point is how come Honeywell and ABB, who operate in this space, are sucessfull with above model?

It is interesting to see comments coming from Wonderware guys, not from Foxboro or SimSci, where domain is nothing more than software engineering.

Saturday, January 23, 2010 - To the person who made the comment on Wednesday, January 20, 2010 about exploiting the cheap overseas labor as other so called successful companies:

I just got a job offer from a friend of mine to work with him at an OEM, as he is now the lead of the Automation group there. The company is now re-building its automation group after a failed attempt to offshore the automation and controls to India.

In this case it came down to logistics. Yes India has very bright and hard working people, and technologies have improved world wide communications. But it is still another country on a different time zone. Most clients want and appreciate face to face meeting and clear understanding of project scope, schedule, and challenges. You'll never get that when dealing with someone on the other side of the planet.

Now if your creating a product that requires little or no customization, you might get away with that doing it in another country (look at many of the bug free products from Microsoft). Otherwise you need local people that understand local requirements.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Folks, the problems with Invensys are a shortage of real strategic direction, and an utter and complete lack of execution. Ulf, Sudipta and crew simply haven't a clue. A Power point deck does not a strategy make.

It has been mentioned many times, but Sudipta's decision to bring along his band of merry men (mostly from Wonderware, and certainly short on cultural diversity) will be the death of the company. These guys are almost all lightweights and amateurs who haven't spent much time actually earning a living in 20 years, as they've been busy nursing off the teat of the cow in the Wonderware lobby. Most of them haven't the foggiest idea about the world outside. The inevitable outcome will be sad, yes, but predictable.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010 - Re: "exploiting what is called value-creation at lower cost"

Utter BS. We have seen "value-creation at lower cost" - it was called IDC. They weren't very good, but they were a lot cheaper on paper than the US developers. Invensys don't think about domain knowledge and they may never have. These products are hard to write and cannot be done by any old developer pulled in off the streets of Lake Forest, Foxboro or Hyderabad. The people who know how these systems work and can develop them are rare and expensive.

Management is trying to sell the company to whatever fool will buy it. At that time, the SOBs at the top will cash out with a happy smile and "I'm all right, Jack!" to the rest of us poor sods. There is no other explanation for such utter stupidity.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

I feel why Invensys isn't sucessfull is because they shy away from exploiting what is called value-creation at lower cost. Invensys is still trying to do more with region based, rather than exploiting the low cost engineering/ development. Meanwhile, competetion like HONEYWELL, ABB, Siemens, Emerson have tens of thousands working in low cost countries (India), but Invensys hardly have one eighth of them. Invensys should shed inhibitions and go ahead with what the market is doing, or the competetion is doing. They shouldn't be bothered about people that get impacted writing blogs about or preaching about 'their own percieved value' which isn't anymore than emotional comments. They should invest where business is growing (APAC).

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

The current state of the business is best described with this quote: "The anguish of low quality lingers long after the sweetness of low cost is forgotten." This is true for all business units throughout Invensys.

All this cost saving plans (while demanding double digit growth) are done at the expense of the working base, who are still trying to serve the customers while working in survival mode. This will first come to an end, when the Top Level Management has sucked the very last penny out of the once successful companies.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Investors are more than likely factoring in rumours regarding the disposal of the rail group, and the resultant cash such a transaction would generate, rather than the upside potential of the company. This is a "book value" play, not a growth investment. The markets that Invensys serves may be expanding in the years ahead, but as the #7 or #8 player globally, they will be an afterthought, not a first choice as a supplier when compared to much larger, more well respected brands.

Were Invensys to have some unique product offerings, the situation might be different, but this is clearly not the case. The R&D pipeline is not primed with anything particularly interesting, either. The head of development has successfully killed off most of the high potential initiatives as they were not in alignment with his views or goals. Sad state of affairs, indeed.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

The real effects of the IOM change won't come through the balance sheet for another year. What comes through immediately is the reduced head-count and contracting off the cost overheads (Development) so things look rosy. Watch in a year when there are no new products, no support for the existing products and no sales force able to sell the old products!

Sunday, January 17, 2010

On paper, the company looks strong at first glance. No debts, oceans of pounds in bank, and in an industry that has strong growth potential. What is not visible to casual investores is that morale is low, we are looking for other work, and the domain knowledge is streaming out the door to the competition. Most investors are fools and do not look further than the current balance sheet. The company has no good future but it's present is very bright. This won't last but it will last long enough to fool people who are easily fooled.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

When I read this blog and look at Invensys' stock performance, there isn't any correlation. The stock perfomance has been quite strong. So what is the flaw? There must be some good news to offset the facts described on this blog or folks are quite negative. Where is the truth? Are the Investors blind? Isn't Sir Nigel Rudd smart?

Saturday, January 16, 2010 - Regarding the last post:

I am an employee of Invensys Middle East and I agree completely. Everyone is taking it one day at a time and there is no motivation or any long term plan. Everybody is just thinking about the next commission or incentive he can make on orders / projects and looking at job opportunities with the competition.

Friday, January 15, 2010

The Invensys Middle East operations are in shambles. Morale is below zero and the management is a joke. Invensys is no longer even considered serious competition by Yokogawa, Honeywell, Emerson and ABB in the Middle East. Worse even the customers think that the Invensys Middle East team is a bunch of jokers floundering from one mismanaged disaster to another.

There are some proprietary jobs that are falling in their laps and these are highlighted as major achievements and crowed about to the powers that be who are absolutely cut off from reality. What else can you expect from a technical organization where the Finance Manager and the Supply Chain Manager call the shots?

Monday, January 11, 2010

I heard that ABB is doing well and have moved most of their America- Europe activities to India / China as well. Even during the most difficult times last year they have managed to do well. I am not sure whether they also have plans to hire people.

Monday, January 11, 2010

Most of the remaining people have seen the examples of their braver or incautious or naive friends who tried speaking up and are now gone. We're all just waiting for our job offers to come in and we'll leave. There isn't a good reason to speak up. No one in authority cares and the people sucking up to them at the next level are spineless sellouts.

What makes me sad is that after all these years of working here, this company is falling apart. We'll never get our company back from these jerks. Beatings will continue until morale improves.

Monday, January 11, 2010 - RE:On Mr. Bhattacharya's watch:

This is true to a large extent. Invensys, as a company, has ceased to exist in true spirit from a year or so. Just a few individuals are managing and manipulating the entire company and driving the company to crazy ends. Who is going to bell the cat?!

Monday, January 11, 2010

On Mr. Bhattacharya's watch, whilst the order book was slightly up, revenues fell and profits dropped nearly in half. Product innovation has also come to a virtual standstill, employee morale is near an all time low, buddy politics have returned to high levels, and customers have significant concern over the long term viability of their existing IOM solutions. Mr. Bhattacharya's response? To dust off the same tired ideas he espoused at SAP.

It is becoming more and more clear that shareholder value would be optimised by the near term disposal/sale of the remaining components of Invensys. If a reasonable offer for the rail group can be obtained from Alstom or others, it should be accepted. Similarly, the IOM group would fetch more value today than it will a year from now. There are a number of diversified companies in Europe, India, and China who would be able to leverage IOM's assets.

Mr. Henrikkson has overstayed his period of utility to the organisation, and rather than riding the curve back to the bottom again, he should, if for no other reason than personal gain, dispose of the assets of the company whilst they still have value.

Sunday, January 10, 2010

I see the shares have shot up, probably in response to Alstom declaring they want to buy Rail. No doubt this would be welcomed from Invensys corporate level. Better start learning French, guys!

Thursday, January 7, 2010 - RE: Once the job market revives, ODC Managers will have a hard time retaining the product knowledge.

Do not exclude managers - they are also eager to leave Cognizant and in-fact would like to be the first ones (but would be interesting to watch whether their wish can succeed). Their technical and managerial inabilities to lead teams has become an open secret in Cognizant and they are finding very hard to meet the SLAs and schedules. Added to their woes, their counterparts in Invensys are busy in making their ends meet by troubling the ODC employees. Which makes it obvious that it is not a partnership deal (as announced by Cognizant and Invensys) and but appears to be parting-away deal. ODC employees beware of the danger and be prepared.

Thursday, January 7, 2010

The dilution of domain knowledge isn't unique to ODC. It happened at Wonderware many years ago, mostly due to growth, not attrition. It was just difficult to find solid developers who also had domain knowledge. Only a handful remain.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

The management does not understand that domain knowledge is what made this company so good, and why the company is failing now. We are all expected to know everything about a product or project after working with the code for a few weeks. Domain knowledge takes much more than that; but telling this to your team lead or project manager shows up on your performance review as having a poor work ethic and a negative attitude.

Honeywell knows the value of domain knowledge. It's why they have so many of our CVs now.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

The funny part with ODC is that Cognizant is stressing on replacing domain guys that are leaving with computer science engineers, as they are cheaply available to this services company. We see ODC and Cognizant senior management downplaying the need for domain engineers. With management asking questions if we really need domain engineers and can other software engineers be trained to do our job, we wonder if the new business objectives of ODC will hold a promising future for us domain engineers.

This apprehension is fueling resignations, and while our cunning management is trying to do damage control by emphasizing the importance of domain experience, we see that they are in fact acting in opposite direction and most new hirings are not of domain engineers.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

It's now evident that Cognizant is finding it too difficult to retain the ODC employees. In Jan 2010, there have been 3 resignations in GSD, 4 in Wonderware and 3 in Foxboro. As per reports Honeywell(India) is sitting with 160 resumes from 0DC, but they are waiting for better market forces. Once the job market revives, ODC Managers will have a hard time retaining the product knowledge.

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

I have heard from another exec that our leader in development has been given specific objectives that he must achieve in order to preserve his job. I hope they are measures like innovation, customer satisfaction, on time delivery and quality - not just cost.

Sunday, January 3, 2010 - Re "15 Signs your workplace is dysfunctional":

I think those of you who commentred on the comparison between their Invensys workplace and the 15 points of a dysfunctional workplace in this article got it WRONG. One person counted 12, and another counted 14. But I did it and got all 15. My surprise is that some parts of the group only rate 12 matches out of a possible 15.

Sunday, January 3, 2010

The current executive team thinks that "long term" means two quarters ahead. I'm sure no one has considered actually MEASURING the results of these initiatives, perhaps with the exception of Mr. Freburger. As stated other times on this blog, Mr. Mody could care less whether it works or doesn't work. If it works, he'll take credit; and if it doesn't, he'll blame it on being "told" to do it.

Sunday, January 3, 2010 - Regarding the outsourcing:

Excellent observation. There were plenty of "slides" pointing out the benefits (cost mostly) but no looking back to measure. I guess the inititaives were not very S.M.A.R.T..... This question should be answered.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

Can anyone give me an update (factual vs original business case) of the following outsourcing initiatives:

1. R&D - Led by Mr. Mody;
2. Finance - Led by Mr. Alison;
3. HR - Led by Ms Larson;
4. Manufacturing - Led by Mr. Freburger.

Saturday, January 2, 2010

How can Matamoros be called a "Center of Excellence". They had no SMT and very little electronic manufacturing when the consolodation was announced. Their only qualifications for being the recieving plant for the consolidation was cheap labor and available floor space. All technical expertise had to be hired.

Saturday, January 2, 2010 - Re"15 Signs" article:

I looked it up and counted 14 out of 15 at IOM. I did not think of when it was a bad idea to put things in writing. I thought of examples of the other 14 though, so pretty bad.

Here is the link:

15 Signs Your Workplace is Dysfunctional

Friday, January 1, 2010

The description of the "untouchables" not being fired, even though they are the "responsibles", is no more obvious than at the top of development. What kind of voodoo does he have to keep Ulf and Sudipta convinced to keep him on?