A three-punch combination in the second half of last year sent national carrier Qantas reeling as ICT expenses rose by AU$20 million.
Increased spending on its eQ application upgrade project, infrastructure costs and holiday bookings saw ICT costs increase by eight percent to AU$259.1 million, it told the Australian Stock Exchange today.
The eQ project commenced in 2002 to upgrade Qantas's legacy payroll, financial, procurement and inventory management systems, using Oracle's E-Business suite running on the Linux operating system.
The airline recorded a spike in reservation costs due to a higher amount of passenger revenue over the holiday season. In addition, Qantas was still experiencing increased infrastructure costs from an October 2005 datacentre migration, which saw its mainframe environment moved from a Sydney CBD facility to an IBM centre in the Sydney suburb of Baulkham Hills.
A few months ago, Qantas started outsourcing around 340 technology jobs to Indian services companies Satyam and Tata Consulting, with some of those positions to be moved to cheaper locations offshore. The airline has recently signed contracts for application development and maintenance with the pair, in addition to Perth-based ICT services company ASG.
Qantas's IT function is manned by chief information officer John Willett, who assumed the role this time last year.
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