1. Understanding about Information Technology Consolidation
After vendor consolidation, its trend for technology consolidation for cost cutting and high
productivity. Redundancy kills when it comes to IT: It can add waste while snuffing out
opportunities to innovate.
What is Technology Consolidation:
The Consolidation of Information Technology Infrastructure initiative is to consolidate the organization
technology infrastructure and services to leverage economies of scale, eliminate redundancy, and
reduce costs through standardization. Consolidation will increase the security, robustness, and
reliability.
Advantages:
 More efficient, standardized systems capable of supporting multiple agencies;
 Reduced redundancy and variation within the state's technology infrastructure;
 Reduction in cost for common infrastructure services;
 Enhanced ability for data sharing;
 Improved ability to successfully leverage IT procurements;
 Enhanced security and privacy measures for the storage and distribution of electronic data;
 Improved core technology support for all state agencies and departments;
 More effective utilization and management of technology personnel;
Three basic approaches to IT consolidation:
Standardization: This approach makes assets and processes look alike—for example, creating and
distributing standard desktop images or implementing a unified set of systems tools and processes
across the enterprise—and leads to simplification and risk reduction.
Centrally located resources: In this approach, equipment, applications, facilities, staff and other
appropriate resources are moved together. Examples include moving scattered smaller data centers to a
central corporate center and moving staff to a center of excellence.
Eliminating redundant capabilities: Cutting redundant capabilities such as hardware, software, and
duplicate staff functions is the most difficult approach. Reducing redundancies can be painful and
expensive, particularly for those related to staff reductions.
IT infrastructure consolidation for several reasons:
 The enterprise most likely grew through acquisitions or mergers therefore unity and loyalty is
primarily vertical rather than horizontal.
 IT environments may be uncommon.
 Basic support services like administration, human resources, and finance and accounting are
stand-alone groups within each business unit.

2. Shared Services:
To best illustrate the relative importance of the IT infrastructure to any enterprise, but more so to a
highly complex multi-layered, multi-division enterprise, consider the model of the railroad industry. This
mode of transportation serves individual customers as well as commercial customers. The rail traveler
(individual customer) has one-type of convenience, the passenger train with a variety of services and
configurations; passenger cars, sleeping cars, dining cars, lounge cars, observation cars, etc. The
commercial customer has the freight train with several types of configurations; a box car, a tanker car, a
refrigerated car, a grain hopper car, a flatbed car to carry tractor trailers or containers, a semi-open car
where goods can be stacked on pallets, etc. The common support components of a railway system are
the tracks and switches, the power (electric or diesel), the signal equipment, the “rules of the way”, the
terminal and yard crews, the train crews, the repair and maintenance organizations, and scheduling, to
name a few. The railway’s infrastructure is comprised of people and equipment dedicated to insuring
that passengers and freight get to where they need to go safely and quickly, regardless of purpose or
destination.
Read more for detailed information:
Reference:
http://www.cioarchives.ca.gov/stateit/consolidation.html
http://www.cioarchives.ca.gov/stateit/consolidationReport.html
http://www.cio.com/article/2437692/infrastructure/reduce-information-technology-complexity--costs-with-consolidation.html
http://www.tbicentral.com/our-white-papers/it-consolidation-and-shared-services/