IT Sector in Armenia

By 2004, the number of IT companies in Armenia reached 140, employing some 4,000 persons.
The major specializations in Armenian IT sector include embedded systems and semiconductor design and testing, multimedia design, industrial automation, Internet applications, custom software development, accounting and financial applications, multimedia designing, web-designing and development and Internet applications. Many companies are involved in the development of management information system (MIS) accounting, industrial automaton solutions, security and encryption, educational software development, artificial intelligence, computer aided design (CAD) and system integration.



Graph 1.1:IT Services Sector Potential,McKinsey &Company 2006
Intense business pressure has developed due to steady economic growth, a competitive environment, and a demand for higher productivity and a need for real-time information. Many seek IT solutions to address these demands.
Business and not-for-profit organizations are doing increasingly larger investments into software and IT solutions. The products with the largest demand by local companies are:
1. Enterprise resource planning system
2. Financial, accounting, payroll, sales, logistics, warehouse and analysis applications
3. Public administration systems
4. Banking applications
5. E-commerce / web development services.

Marketing Management & Marketing Plan

(a) Remote Access to Library Services

Presently, libraries entertain reference and referral services received through phones, mails, and those who come personally. With the availability of Internet, libraries can use their homepages to advertise their services, such as, calendar of events, new IT services, new collection of topical subject, local heritage, sales of library publications in their homepages. Public can also access library's OPAC from homes and offices. Libraries can introduce Online Reference Inquiry Form (ORIF) in their homepage. Library users will be able to key in reference inquires through the ORIF or to search libraries' databases from any locations at any time. Hence, libraries are able to provide 24-hour services. In future, such service will include online self-registration of membership, request for reservation and extension of loans, or request for literature search from reference sources. For referral services, libraries should be able to source out reference inquiries not available in the collection from other libraries in the countries or from oversea, thus making it possible that global information be accessible to the general public. Online reference inquiries will ensure better and faster means of delivery of information products and services.

(b) Online Community Information Services

Libraries can develop online community information services and have it in the net. Local youth members of the Rakan Muda (Youth Friendship Group) can be trained in the use of IT, compilation and processing of local information for the net. Public library can organized special youth computer camp to collect local information and develop community information center. This can be done by working closely with local youth associations. The Online Community Information Services can include the following information: community leaders, local community events, local sport events, directories of public utilities and youth associations, local entertainment centers, places of interest to tourists, local historical and cultural heritages, publications of interest to local communities and youth, local news and community forum. Local businesses can be invited to advertise their products and services. Advertisement in homepages can generate income for libraries.

(c) One-stop Information Center for IT Products and Services

Libraries can be developed as a one-stop community information center for IT services. By allowing library users to access variety of online databases available through the Internet, users do not have to go to different places to get information. They can navigate the WWW by themselves or with the assistance of library staff. By integrating IT products and services with other print product will make learning more interesting and enjoyable. Libraries therefore, are developing as an info media and edutainment center. Through effective inter-library loan and document delivery services, users will be able to obtain information or documents of their interest from other libraries. Thus, the nation's library resources can be made available to any library, thereby realizing the system of national availability of information for the benefit of the society.

(d) Packaging of Information

For personalized services, library staff should be able to response to request for literature search on specific information. Such literature search will include: compilation or bibliographies on selected topics of interest to specific user needs; compilation of addresses for contact; compilation of data, statistic and fact related business; compilation of profile on business products, country profile for potential market; developing metadata on relevant websites, creating hyperlink of relevant websites to cater for special user needs, etc. The library staff should be able to search for such information from different sources either from available reference sources or from the Internet, and repackage that specific information in according to specific individual request, thus providing value-added services. Packaging of information tailored toward specific information needs is a mean of providing personalized services to users. Such services can be charged accordingly. For continuous improvement of such services, libraries should devise a feedback mechanism to determine the levels of satisfaction of services rendered.

Marketing Management & Marketing Plan

IT is inability to market effectively cements its cost center role in the enterprise: communicating status but not value, fulfilling requests but not solving problems, and partially deploying technologies but not delivering expected results. IT organizations need to embrace the concepts, terminology, and process of marketing - creating marketing plans, executing campaigns, and boosting brand equity. The result will be delivery of the right projects for the right audience, accelerated time to benefit, and increased trust of the IT organization. The firms that embrace the marketing of IT first will be those with customer-facing technology, shared services, and strong process discipline. Marketing, the process by which a product or service originates and is then priced, promoted, and distributed to consumers. In large corporations the principal marketing functions precede the manufacture of a product. They involve market research and product development, design, and testing. Marketing concentrates primarily on the buyers, or consumers. After determining the customers’ needs and desires, marketers develop strategies that are designed to educate customers about a product’s most important features, persuade them to buy it, and then to enhance their satisfaction with the purchase. Where marketing once stopped with the sale, today businesses believe that it is more profitable to sell to existing customers than to new ones. As a result, marketing now also involves finding ways to turn one-time purchasers into lifelong customers. Marketing includes planning, organizing, directing, and controlling the decision-making regarding product lines, pricing, promotion, and servicing. In most of these areas marketing has overall authority; in others, as in product-line development, its function is primarily advisory. In addition, the marketing department of a business firm is responsible for the physical distribution of the products, determining the channels of distribution that will be used, and supervising the profitable flow of goods from the factory or warehouse. In order to promote the use of IT products and services, libraries must develop marketing plans to market its services. The marketing plan should include the following services:

Information technology

Information technology (IT), as defined by the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA), is "the study, design, development, implementation, support or management of computer-based information systems, particularly software applications and computer hardware."[1] IT deals with the use of electronic computers and computer software to convert, store, protect, process, transmit, and securely retrieve information.

Today, the term information technology has ballooned to encompass many aspects of computing and technology, and the term has become very recognizable. The information technology umbrella can be quite large, covering many fields. IT professionals perform a variety of duties that range from installing applications to designing complex computer networks and information databases. A few of the duties that IT professionals perform may include data management, networking, engineering computer hardware, database and software design, as well as the management and administration of entire systems.

When computer and communications technologies are combined, the result is information technology, or "infotech". Information technology is a general term that describes any technology that helps to produce, manipulate, store, communicate, and/or disseminate information. Presumably, when speaking of Information Technology (IT) as a whole, it is noted that the use of computers and information are associated.

The term information technology is sometimes said to have been coined by Jim Domsic of Michigan in November 1981.[citation needed] Domsic, who worked as a computer manager for an automotive related industry, is supposed to have created the term to modernize the outdated phrase "data processing". The Oxford English Dictionary, however, in defining information technology as "the branch of technology concerned with the dissemination, processing, and storage of information, esp. by means of computers" provides an illustrative quote from the year 1958 (Leavitt & Whisler in Harvard Business Rev. XXXVI. 41/1 "The new technology does not yet have a single established name. We shall call it information technology.") that predates the so-far unsubstantiated Domsic coinage.

In recent years ABET and the ACM have collaborated to form accreditation and curriculum standards for degrees in Information Technology as a distinct field of study separate from both Computer Science and Information Systems. SIGITE is the ACM working group for defining these standards.