CIO 100 COMPANIES IN Transport and Distribution

6. Royal Mail Group

With its market now open to competition, the last year was a bit strange for the Royal Mail Group business but in IT terms it was pretty good, according to its group technology director David Burden. “We still managed to cut 10 per cent from our costs, while at the same time absorbing a range of new technologies and systems,” he says.

12. DHL

DHL Logistics is ahead with its planned integration with UK logistics company Exel, that its parent company Deutsche Post bought at the end of 2005 for £3.7 billion. The organisation had said it hoped to complete the integration in two to three years, but Nigel Underwood, CIO of DHL Logistics, is hoping to conclude the integration work by the end of this year.

27. BA

BA’s key achievement in the last 12 months is its continued success in the online space, according to Paul Coby, BA’s CIO. “It has been a huge success, moving from niche to mainstream in a very short time. Around 60 per cent of check-ins are done using self-service now in terminal four.”

31. Network Rail

Network Rail’s IT organisation has had its fair share of achievements over the last year, not least of which is the high profile appointment of the new IM director, Catherine Doran, who arrived last June from BT. The team has implemented a major data warehouse project, which holds train performance data, and is used for operational performance monitoring.

35. Arriva

Arriva, one of the largest transport services organisations in Europe, has a major presence in nine European countries: Czech Republic, Denmark, Italy, Germany, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the UK. Employing more than 33,000 staff, the company is the largest bus operator in London and the largest private bus operator in Italy, Denmark and The Netherlands.

37. FirstGroup

FirstGroup is in the middle of an acquisition. Laidlaw International, the yellow school bus operator and owner of Greyhound, is being bought by FirstGroup for £2 billion and, assuming the buyout goes ahead, it will make FirstGroup the largest bus operator in the US, with less than 20 per cent of the American market and giving it ample opportunities for growth.

39. Ford of Europe

Last year Ford of Europe’s head of IT, Bill Fairclough, stated that the company would be concentrating on service levels, critical systems and security controls. The business focus was on cost and IT was focusing on simplification and consolidation of its infrastructure and systems.

73. Land Rover and Jaguar

Michael Ali, CIO of Jaguar and Land Rover, says the organisation has had a good year and is still making progress in its markets. The two brands are both part of Ford’s Premier Automotive Group, which recently sold off Aston Martin.

92. BAA

In June 2006, BAA was bought by a consortium led by Ferrovial, the Spanish construction company, and in August officially delisted from the London Stock Exchange. BAA is one of the world’s leading airport companies owning seven UK airports and having management contracts at a number of international airports.

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