Case del Libro

1. What would be your decission? Would you stick to the previously developed UNIX platform, or switch to the new Microsoft one?

I will switch to the new Microsoft one.
Since dot com burst, the company has obliged to reduce cost.
Also, the development of previous platform project did not work well – bad system architecture and operations - in spite of too much investment. If this situation goes on, this project would absolutely go into “Death March”.
Generally, system availability and reliability of UNIX is higher than those of Windows system, but, if it is not well designed or implemented (In this project, NOT!!), it would “sit on a gold mine”.

Considering these situation, the company should change their strategy from high platform to simple one.
At first, the company develops simple platform, and then, if this system is fully utilized and required system expansion, we can expand more.

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To engineer & system administrators, high platform -high speech hardware & software- is really happy, if project worked well. The system reliability, availability, functionality, and performance are higher than new one, so they do not have to devote too much time to performance tuning and system recovery in case it downs.

2. Which are the most relevant criteria for you to make the decision? Just name each criterion, and explain it very briefly.

There are 3 criteria for me to judge IT investment; Quality, Cost, and Functionality.

Quality – to win a customer’s trust, high quality products & services are required. UNIX system reliability is higher than Windows, but, in this case, because of the failure of system design, this edge is lost. Instead, even the cheap & simple platform, if it is well designed, the system quality might be better.

Cost－cost effective estimation is really required in case system development. Even if you use sophisticated system, if it is deficit, it does not make sense. Casa del Libro has to reduce cost as much as possible. The current platform costs a lot and system maintenance also will cost a lot. After careful cost simulation, if Case del Libro cannot receive enough profit, they should change to new platform.

Functionality － Full and easy functionality is attractive. If system does not provide enough function or usability, it is not attractive at all. I think functionality is dependent on application/software, so in this case, it does not matter whether Case del Libro chooses UNIX platform or Windows Platform.

In conclusion, considering above 3 criteria, changing new platform is more attractive and Case del Libro can minimize their business risk.