SUISA’s IT under new management

About seven years ago, in December 2011, the SUISA Board approved a new IT strategy in the course of the 2012 budget ratification. The effects of what was summarised in the article “Budget 2012 wrapped up” in SUISAinfo, edition 1.12, had a few consequences in the following years.

The main goal had been to replace SUISA’s IT with the IBM large-scale system and the reorganisation of the IT landscape into a modern architecture. Thanks to the new architecture, IT-based services have been significantly expanded since then. Needs and requirements of members, staff and SUISA customers could be satisfied more quickly and more flexibly with the new developments.

Expansion of online services for members and customers

Members have the option today to process daily SUISA matters via the online app “my account”. In the password-protected member area, settlements are made available electronically every quarter, works registrations can also be carried out. SUISA customers also benefit from the expansion of the online services; most recently due to the online notification of usages for background music or public viewing (CT 3a).

Numerous additional technical developments make our staff members’ work easier and help us save personnel costs. Among such developments are, for example, a digital document management system (DMS) for all member files or the fundamental technical renovation of our works documentation which also enables us to globally carry out online licensing of the works in cooperation with our joint venture partner SESAC in Mint Digital Services.

New management team appointed

The number of staff in the IT sector has increased during that time from 23 to 30. In order to safeguard a circumspect and competent management, the Board has appointed the previous manager of the Applications Technology department, Jürg Ziebold, as overall Manager of SUISA’s IT, and Dieter Wijngaards as new Manager of Applications Technology as of 1 January.

SUISA’s IT setup of two departments continues and comprises, Applications Technology and Systems Technology. Jürg Ziebold directly manages the two heads of department, Dieter Wijngaards (Applications Technology) and Hansruedi Jung (Systems Technology) and a team of business analysts. Whereas Hansruedi Jung has been in charge of the Systems Technology department since 2006, Dieter Wijngaards joins the SUISA IT team on 1 April 2019. Dieter Wijngaards used to be CTO (Chief Technology Officer) at Adesso Schweiz AG and had already been consulting SUISA’s IT since 2012 during the development of the new IT architecture.

SUISA’s Executive Committee is pleased with the appointment of the new IT management team and is convinced that it thus continues to safeguard the central role of IT in terms of executing business processes. It wishes the new IT management good luck.