“In order not to be left behind by the competition, businesses can and must do much more to help their own employees make greater use of new digital technologies.”
IT-DIRECTOR : Mr Schorer, in what way is digitalisation not only relevant to IT managers and company directors but also to end users?
O. Schorer: Today, digitalisation is also used to refer to modern workplace arrangements and the ‘mobile workspace’. This means finding the best possible way of using digital technology to meet the needs of all users. Nowadays, employees want the flexibility to be able to work from home or when travelling – and that’s why they want to be involved in designing their own mobile workspace.
IT DIRECTOR: How has CHG-MERIDIAN itself changed as a result of digitalisation?
O. Schorer: We have expanded our focus beyond the traditional financing business and toward efficient technology management and the intelligent provision of services that results from this. [...]
Digitalisation is now opening up whole new perspectives and we are taking full advantage of these. For us, it’s becoming less about the IT assets themselves and much more about having an efficient, flexible, and low-cost landscape of digital processes and services in which IT assets are just one of many components.
IT DIRECTOR: What does that mean in practice?
O. Schorer: […] In practice, that means that we, as a service provider, are increasingly delivering customised business concepts that are helping customers to digitalise their own processes in a simple and hassle-free way. A customised business concept can be thought of as a subscription, in which integrated technologies and services are used for defined periods of time along the customer’s digital process chain. In other words, we take care of the digitalisation of our customers’ processes.
IT-DIRECTOR: Is the popularity of cloud services with customers a key reason for the general decline in wanting to purchase hardware?
O. Schorer: No, and in fact, although fewer services are required, employees still need desktops or mobile devices in order to work with the cloud services. We are witnessing a shift away from desktop PCs, with employees now preferring to use a variety of mobile devices. It is not uncommon for employees to use several mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, alongside conventional PCs, thereby tailoring their ‘next-generation workspace’ to suit their own requirements. We are already seeing organisations getting rid of their telephone systems completely and are instead relying on mobile devices combined with web-based voice-over-IP applications.
“Thanks to our fully digitalised processes for procurement, operations and end-of-life, we can help any business to make savings in the double-digit percentage range.”
IT-DIRECTOR: What trend in mobile technology is making you sit up and take notice?
O. Schorer: When it comes to mobile technology, the focus is shifting from hardware to apps, software and services. The end devices are simply the means to an end. By all means users should be given the choice of their preferred device that enables them to be as productive as possible. But at the end of the day it’s all about the efficient and secure provision of apps and services and how they are used.
IT-DIRECTOR: How much could customers save using automated mobile services?
O. Schorer: Thanks to our fully digitalised processes for procurement, operations and end-of-life, we can help any business to make savings in the double-digit percentage range. It is not uncommon for companies to lack an overview of contracts, a functioning support system and a system for managing telecoms expenses before they introduce our mobile services. We often find that these processes were still being managed on a department-by-department basis using Excel or paper forms.
Marital status: Married, two children
Biography:
Responsible for IT at CHG-MERIDIAN since 1999
Chief Information Officer (CIO) since 2009
In 2013, Schorer became a member of the expanded Board of Management, and he has since driven forward the addition of new services to the CHG-MERIDIAN portfolio
Since 2017, Oliver Schorer has been the member of the CHG-MERIDIAN Board of Management responsible for IT and Services and the Company’s CIO.
Hobbies: Music, ice hockey
