Siemens Information Systems has an enviable lineage in its parent Siemens. The company also gets a lot of its business from Siemens, but Rajneesh De says that it is now trying to change things and no longer depend on Siemens alone

Laud believes sisl’s strength lies in its Siemens lineage

Incorporated in 1992 as a Siemens subsidiary, Siemens Information Systems Limited (SISL) has today come a long way from being only a Siemens protégé to become a major player in the Indian software space. The measure of its success can be gauged from its steady growth rate over the last three years it reached a size of Rs 179.2 crore in 2000 from Rs 166.91 crore in 1999 (a growth rate of 7 percent) and to a more spectacular Rs 225.73 crore in 2001 (a growth rate of 26 percent). Regarded as one of the pioneers in R&D on emerging technologies in India, SISL has a diversified global clientele in areas like telecom, healthcare, manufacturing, transportation, media, retail and utilities, as well as in the public sector and government.

Vaidya claims most of SISL’s algorithms are totally unique

However, though SISL might have emerged on its own in the last few years, managing director Anil Laud stresses the point that its strength lies in its lineage from Siemens Business Services, one of Europe’s most respected IT firms. In fact, it still is a subsidiary of Siemens, with the parent company holding 74.8 percent of the total share capital. According to Laud, SISL was conceived as an extended workbench for Siemens’ operations in Germany, with an aim to take advantage of competitive and bench strengths in India. As a result, in the initial years the entire workload came from Siemens, Germany and some projects from Siemens, Italy. Later, it was decided to convert SISL into a separate business unit leveraging the core competencies it has developed through Siemens. The chosen approach, according to Laud was specialisation in verticals including e-business.

Despite spreading its wings, the bulk of SISL’s business still comes from its parent in Germany. In 2001, Germany contributed to 35 percent of SISL’s total turnover, followed by the US at 26 percent, the UK at 17 percent and South Africa at 2 percent. The domestic market too contributed a substantial 26 percent of SISL’s total revenues. As A S Vishwanath, director, SISL proudly admits, the fact is that SISL openly flouts its Siemens lineage to win offshore contracts from different geographies. And this has worked since SISL’s exports increased from 61 percent of its turnover to 80 percent in the last year.

Healthcare

According to Kailas, sisl works mostly in high-end niche technology areas

SISL has developed a core competency in medical systems and healthcare, a domain where Siemens has been traditionally strong. According to Laud, this domain contributes around 30 percent of SISL’s total revenues, with the Hospital Information System (HIS) developed by the SISL Healthcare Group being the principal contributor. SISL undertook development of its indigenous HIS solution for the domestic market in early 1996, after initial market exploration. Developmental activities began when huge business opportunity was envisaged in the domestic market because of nascent IT penetration among Indian hospitals, and the growing trend towards computerisation. It was during mid-1999 that the then Siemens Health Services (SHS) Germany evinced interest in SISL’s HIS solutions and entered into a business tie-up.

Says B Kulkarni, deputy general manager, HIS, “The last five years have witnessed increasing awareness of the enabling role of IT in hospitals, and hence the growing demand for HIS solutions. From manual paper-based systems, many hospitals have been moving up the cycle automating their registration and billing systems, with very few hospitals attempting to automate their clinical, non-clinical and back office functions.” SISL has deployed its HIS solution at Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, a 900-bed super-speciality hospital, located in Kochi. HIS has also been interfaced with a picture archival and communication system, laboratory instruments and equipment in critical care. All this has resulted in significant cost savings through improved operational control, enhanced utilisation of hospital resources, and online access of electronic patient records (EPR), facilitating better patient care.

The HIS solution has been implemented in foreign shores too, including one for networking 33 hospitals in Argentina and in more than 60 state-run hospitals in Malaysia and South Africa. In 2001, the healthcare group also grew locally, adding clients like Schefflien Leprosy & Training Research Centre, Karigiri, (whose IT initiatives are funded by the ASHA grant of the US), Sitaram Bhartia Hospital & Research Centre, Delhi and Malabar Institute of Medical Sciences, Calicut, a super-speciality hospital with NRI investment. Other prestigious names on the client roster include sophisticated diagnostic centres and nursing homes like Vikram Clinic in Delhi and Krishna Heart Institute in Ahmedabad.

Telecom

The telecom group provides complete end-to-end solutions, system integration and support services in the telecom domain and contributes around 15-18 percent of SISL’s total revenues. According to Arup Sengupta, who heads the telecom enterprise, SISL has developed Callconnect, a call centre solution for automatic call routing, and an interactive voice response application called Telemaster for enterprises to manage customer interaction effectively. Telemaster has been adopted by DoT, MTNL and the Indian Railways, while Callconnect has been implemented by Bharti in Delhi, BSNL in Hyderabad, Bharti Telenet in Bhopal and Grameen Phone in Bangladesh.

According to Vishwanath, sisl is the preferred national implementation partner for SAP in india today

SISL also launched SmartPay, a CDR-based prepaid system for cellular operators with a flexible, subscriber-dependent tariff structure used to identify a set of parameters for the calculation of subscriber specific charges. According to Sengupta, the system can detect a credit balance that has fallen below a pre-set minimum amount. As a result it can tear down a stable call, after partial CDR is rated. It also allows for Web-based multiple circle usage and roaming. Reliance Telecom in Kolkata upgraded their pre-paid billing system with additional SmartPay licences for 150,000 subscribers. International successes include the installation of General Administration and Billing System (GABS) for telecom service providers like Africell in South Africa and Gambia, a telematics back-office system for Ford Motor in the UK and man-machine interface software for Siemens Mobile Phones and development of UMTS nodes for Siemens-ICM.

Business solutions

According to Kulkarni, the market is seeing a growing demand for his solutions

business solutions continue to remain one of the most lucrative revenue streams for SISL, contributing almost 25 percent of its total revenues. SISL-Business Solutions (SISL-BS) has pioneered SAP implementation in India, that being the thrust area of its business. According to Vishwanath, today SISL has the status of a preferred national implementation partner for SAP in India as well as value added reseller for sale of SAP licenses in India. SISL started its SAP focus as country logo partner for SAP in India from 1994 to 1996. SISL was national business partner for SAP for 1997 to 1998. From being a SAP R/3 product reseller, consultant and pioneer of SAP implementations in India, SISL-BS also developed the country specific version of R/3, currently termed as CIN (Country India Version). SISL-BS was also a part of development team for development of SAP HR for the Asian marketplace. Adds Laud, “SISL has further strengthened its commitment to SAP by venturing into SAP education and training. Together with SAP, SISL-BS launched Sapient College authorised training centres at Chennai and Delhi, covering a standard curriculum, which is both intensive and demanding, for end-users as well as consultants.”

SEngupta’s telecom division is doing extensive work in IVR and call centre solutions

SISL in partnership with leading companies like i2 Technologies, Siebel and Webmethods is also implementing e-business solutions resulting in automating business processes and building customer responsive and cost-effective supply chains on proven platforms. The group started in 1997 with the i2 consulting practice. It has grown and matured over the years with global exposure in various implementation exercises. The group has added various other practices into its portfolio in tune with the latest technology developments to provide clientele with the complete range of e-business services. It has a worldwide clientele, with a strong presence in the European and South East Asian market. Clients include Dole Asia, NEC, Asian Paints, Swagelok, Sabritas, Siam Cements, Samsung, LG Electronics, Infenion, Pepsi, Sherwin Williams, Siemens-ICM and Siemens IT Services. One of its major domestic successes is the implementation in Asian Paints.

As part of its focused media initiative, SISL-BS also provides complete solutions to the media industry. Says Vishwanath, “We have been providing solutions to leading media organisations, including Hindustan Times, Anand Bazar Patrika, Malayala Manoram, Dainik Bhaskar and Tata in India.” In addition, the critical success factor in implementation of SAP, as with any other application package, according to Laud, is the implementation and consultancy support. The range of services offered by SISL in the area of SAP consultancy spans across feasibility studies, R/3 installation, customisation, training, and basis support. With 60-plus implementations completed and 15-plus sites undergoing implementation, SISL has customers like Blue Cross Labs, Cadbury’s India, E-Merck, Godavari Sugar Mills, Hero Honda, Hindustan Times, Intas Pharmaceuticals, Mercedes Benz India, Osram India, Sudarshan Chemicals and Unit Trust Of India.

Software@Bangalore
The Software Development (SD) group in Bangalore, under the stewardship of Sudarsh Kailas, is primarily oriented to provide high value software services to various Siemens companies around the globe. According to Kailas, SD focuses its expertise in certain core domains in which it has built up considerable experience over the years. These include biometrics, medical, automotive, embedded systems, transportation, simulation tools, process control and automation.

The group is actively involved with Siemens Transportation System, UK in the West Coast route modernisation programme for the implementation of an IVR system for the railway network. It is also developing medical diagnostic applications for Siemens CT and OCS modalities. Adds Kailas, “In the last financial year we successfully delivered CT-ICS VA40A version to our CT customer, the Web-based e-simulation or virtual product introduction for the Siemens SL45 and S45 mobile phones and SIMPAD devices of Siemens ICM division, Munich.”

SISL made its foray in the biometrics field through the development of an autonomous speaker recognition system, which can be used for security purposes to identify and authorise a speaker by analysing his/her voice. Says Kailas, “Our speaker identification system is the first text-independent system worldwide. Our customer, the Central Forensic Science Laboratories in Chandigarh, works for the Indian government to track down and identify criminals by comparing their voice samples through our software.” Other biometrics successes of the Bangalore group include a fingerprint identification and management system (FIMS) and the language independent speaker identification system (LISIS).

The Medical Group develops medical software, its main customer being Siemens AG MED, a leading global player in the area of medical imaging solutions. Projects executed include SYNGO, VSIM, Magic Viewer, Sirius, CT-ICS and CT-IRS. SISL also provides consultancy services at customer sites for the various divisions of Siemens AG MED. Says Kailas, “Often called ‘Windows for medical applications’, SYNGO is the dominant medical software platform for Europe and the USA, totalling more than 1,000 installations worldwide.” SYNGO serves as an intermediary for applications like VSIM, CT-ICS and others and provides core functionalities like 2D/3D evaluation, archiving, etc. VSIM (virtual simulation) is SYNGO-based multi-modality 3D visualisation software being developed for Siemens Oncology Care Systems, USA. The software enables localisation of target structures and the designing of beams for creating the radiotherapy plan. VSIM acts as a bridge between diagnostic workstations and dose delivery systems. Magic Viewer is a cost-effective solution designed for displaying and editing radiological images from all modalities that comply with DICOM standards on a PC. Worldwide, there are more than 6,000 installations of Magic Viewer.

Sirius is a SYNGO-based viewing software, replicating all of Magic Viewer’s functionalities for a SYNGO environment. The CT Image Control System (ICS) is a new generation CT software based on the architecture, libraries and guidelines stipulated by the underlying SYNGO architecture. SISL has contributed in developing the scan components and applications. The scan components provide services to control and access service functionalities/parameters of the scanner. The applications serve to evaluate the images and provide statistical results to aid in diagnosis. Some examples of the application components developed by SISL include Osteo, Pulmonary, Volume and Dynamics. The image reconstruction system (IRS) is responsible for receiving data from the gantry, reconstruction of images from the received data and high-speed transfer of these reconstructed images and raw data to the ICS.

In the field of graphic products, the group has been successful in making inroads into Siemens ICN projects with its GIS and software development consultants where its is developing telecom network management solutions, with spatial and non-spatial data management. PDM Consulting Services in USA has established SISL as a competent partner for both SDRC/EDS as well as Agile. Similarly, in the UK SISL has established a direct relationship with EDS for providing services on PDM. Projects were executed in Boeing, Flextronics, Solectron, etc, quite successfully. Siemens, Centre of e-excellence, Singapore, has been chosen the IT services group for its workflow application through Livelink tools.

The major projects group, in addition to its successful ongoing association with SBS-UK in the National Savings Account, has credited itself with many application integration projects in the e-business and related areas. Notable amongst them are its large-scale participation in the prestigious VI-MoT project of SBS in the UK, attempting to automate vehicle testing for roadworthiness across 19,000 garages in the UK and design-build of related e-sales system prototype for these garages. In addition, it has further consolidated its exclusive position with Siemens AG and other partner company Rail Consult GmbH as an application integrator in the area of ticketing systems by winning strategic orders from both Netherlands and Germany.

Software@Pune
SISL’s Scientific Applications Centre (SAC) was established in Pune in 1998 with Vinay Vaidya at the helm. Its success stories include development of an atmospheric disturbance model for Boeing flight simulators, engine and auto throttle control simulation, modelling and simulation of Weibul clutter, GPS and INS error modelling for measurement simulation. It is also responsible for design of a control system for wind shear control on the Boeing 767, design of a control system for the flight management system for the Boeing 747, primary flight control system software as well as the development of Kalman filters for GPS and INS integrated with GPS in feedforward and feedback configurations.

Vaidya takes justifiable pride in the fact that SAC has indigenously developed the ‘Intelligent Digital Passport’ (IDP), an intelligent access control system that uses biometrics verification. Even the JPEG2000 compression standard was developed in this Pune centre. Other innovative products to come out of the SISL stable in Pune include the Photo Attendance System (Recorder +), automatic flight coupon recognition system, medical imaging and satellite imaging.

Both Kailas and Vaidya point out some unique facets of their respective technology groups in Bangalore and Pune. Says Kailas, “We operate in a very exclusive niche area-highest-end IPR-rich technology development. We carefully choose a few areas with strong synergy among these and where we can make the best impact, thus being very cost-effective in our technology development. Lastly, we have a network of experts who are truly the finest anywhere in the world, many are inventors of new techniques and they will work for no one else.” Adds Vaidya, “We tackle the problem from the fundamentals from basic principles, providing a completely new way of solving it. Besides, all technology is developed from ground-up in-house, so there is complete control over every tiny aspect of the technology. Many of our algorithms are totally new only a handful of people worldwide would even understand the techniques. Another unique feature is that even the standard algorithms are applied in novel ways, giving accuracy that is better than the best available anywhere.”