He then moved into the corporate distribution division within the organization, with the responsibility of making six different companies synergize in technology, activities and systems. Four years ago, Kamath joined IMC Global as the CIO.
“This is a traditional, fifty-year old company in the mining business. We produce two out of the three ingredients that make up fertlizers. As a global player, we ship to international markets in China, India, and the Far East Asian countries,” says Kamath. IMC had gone through multiple acquisitions when Kamath came on board, and he was given the responsibilities not only of consolidation of the IT side, but also enabling the sales groups, purchasing, HR and other divisions’ needs.
As one of the larger deployers of ERP implementation of Oracle, IMC spends approximately $30 million on IT needs. “We were on the front end of the change process in bringing e-commerce initiatives. This is a stodgy market, yet we maintained the position that we need these services when the time comes for change,” says Kamath. “We invested in a start-up fertilizer portal, which didn’t yield many results, yet we have managed to build a very strong e-commerce platform for our distinctly different audiences, like cooperatives who work on Oracle and SAP platforms, to the other end of the spectrum, like dealers who still work on a dial-up!”
Some initiatives included self-service products that help both ends of the spectrum evolve their use of the portals. As the CIO, Kamath plays the dual role of integrating technology with business needs. “We see ourselves as general contractors who would build a house: we integrate products, effect change agents, leverage technologies to improve performance. Adopting a new technology is still a challenge, and sometimes the same speed of change does not occur in the marketplace,” says Kamath. He builds teams where the members are change managers, who will handle and use the technologies at the end of implementation.
At IMC, outsourcing is a very strategic process. “We’d like people to be involved in strategic roles within the company. Our goal is to outsource the more mundane responsibilities, while we encourage our teams to take on more involved roles. We have consciously taken elements of our infrastructure and outsourced them to hosting partners. And through that process, we have also consolidated the multiple data-centers (which came through acquisitions), and have got away from creating our data groups or infrastructure groups. We have a small maintenance group, but we mainly depend on outsourcing for our needs,” says Kamath.
As a large company, it might be expected that IMC would possibly have sought large companies for its outsourcing needs. “On the contrary,” says Kamath. Despite being a large company, IMC does not have complex transactional needs. We are conscious of the turmoil in the market and are divvying up the IT outsourcing among many small players,” explains Kamath. IMC has also used offshore resources at times for integration projects.
IMC has some plant automation processes in place, which are quite complex. Instrumentation and mine-planning needs are foremost, which are complex planning needs for plant functioning. Kamath’s team plays a critical role in integrating packaged applications with plant processes, where the data integration with resource simulation helps the engineering group plan future mining maps.
How does Kamath evaluate new technologies and products? “We have a stringent pre-qualification process, where vendor proposals are keenly evaluated with respect to IMC needs,” says Kamath. “I have had vendors call me and ask, ‘How do I help you?’ Where do I start? But we make it a point to constantly seek new processes and products that would meet our ever-changing needs. Context is all important. Unless we see immediate utilization of the expense, we would be wary of it.”
“Outsourcing depends a lot on relationships,” says Kamath. He feels that outsourcing is an extension of what is happening within the IMC, and the vendor needs to understand IMC’s vision and build the right relationship on an ongoing basis.
IMC’s business process outsourcing (BPO) has been limited to a few departments: human resources and engineering, health and safety, and technology. Kamath feels that the other areas like customer call centers, which are value-driven, are not very cost-driven for IMC that they would choose the offshore BPO models.
Kamath has been able to meet the IT needs of IMC very efficiently, with a small team of 100-odd people. “We are proud of the fact that we were ranked the top 51 by Information Week, which only proves our measure of success,” says Kamath. In fact, IMC has been working on their portal security initiative, well before it became an important issue after the 9/11 attacks.
From a chemical engineering to CIO, Kamath has come a long way. He advises that “technology alone does not help. We need to be perceptive of how technology will function in context.” Kamath has a word of advice for career builders. “We come from a different country and bring totally different perspectives to work. The onus is on us to become part of the environment we work and live in. To this end, we must open our minds and change our attitudes.” He has come across many instances, where the technology expert fails poorly in getting his view across. “It is not the technology alone that is being viewed. The person presenting it is the face of that technology. Are you presenting your best side?” asks Kamath.
