Hartford, CT - Dec 4, 2003 - Now more than ever CIO's are expected to demonstrate business value from IT investments. Achieving this goal was the focal point of a business seminar hosted by Barometrix and its partner Ajilon Consulting today at the Hartford Club. Attended by local CIO's representing a variety of industries including insurance, financial, construction, technology and non-profit, executives exchanged ideas, best practices, methods and experiences in measuring and communicating the business value of IT.

"The cost and benefit of IT investments should be visible, just like any other business investment," asserted David Vellante, President and CEO of Barometrix. In his session, Mr. Vellante discussed how to determine the true cost and value of IT investments and how they contribute to organizational performance. Attendees reviewed case examples as to how Barometrix enterprise portfolio software is being used by CIO's and business executives to make business-based IT decisions.

Vellante shared with the audience the fundamental principles in the Barometrix approach, including the direct linkages between value, business processes, applications, IT users and organizational performance; including the income statement, cash flows, balance sheet, valuation metrics and other key performance indicators. The points prompted discussions around the difficulty executives face in translating gut feel into a system that can be measured and made actionable to the business.

Bob Ryder, Vice President of Ajilon Consulting's Professional Services practice said in his session; "Measuring and managing IT value cannot be a one time event. Even an annual snapshot is insufficient to assure that IT decisions are based on business value." Ryder shared his 20+ years of business and IT expertise with the audience and reviewed Ajilon's IT Value Management Lifecycle, specifically designed to establish an ongoing enterprise discipline of value based decision-making.

Ryder also discussed why many portfolio management systems leave us so dissatisfied. Attendees explored this notion from several perspectives including the following:

• Most systems focus solely on project initiatives and miss the connection to currently deployed enterprise applications;
• Most systems only quantify costs in dollar terms;
• When "Value" is included, its definition is typically weak and hard to compare across departments or outside the enterprise;

The CIO's in attendance discussed the importance and challenges of holding business people, not just IT, accountable for investment allocations, at which point one CIO commented, "There is no such thing as an IT project."

About Barometrix
Barometrix is a privately held software company founded in 1999 by leading business and technology professionals. The company develops powerful portfolio management and business analytics solutions designed to link IT and other investments to corporate financial performance. The company's software has been used at several hundred organizations in North America, Europe, the Asia/Pacific region and other emerging countries to focus IT investments on returning optimal business value.

About Ajilon Consulting
Ajilon Consulting is a complete service provider of IT business solutions including software quality assurance, software testing, systems development and integration, help desk services, outsourcing, and supplemental IT services. In 1995, Ajilon Consulting became the first U.S. information technology services firm to achieve ISO 9001 certification of its quality system. Headquartered in Towson, Md., Ajilon Consulting has over 40 offices nationwide with additional locations in Canada, United Kingdom, Continental Europe and Australia. Clients include Fortune 1000 companies and large multinationals, mid-size corporations and public employers in a full range of industries including manufacturing, finance, telecommunications, healthcare, transportation and insurance. More information is available at www.ajilonconsulting.com