Antrix Corporation Limited

February 19th, 2012

antrix corporation limitedRum comes from the Indo-European *-ru = “open” → Germanic * ru-ma- = “open” → Old Norse rumr = “spacious” ( adjective ) → “space” ( noun ). Word was then only a description that said that something was open. Later it was used to describe the “it” that openness was in, then the space. Space is assumed to be a “something” which is open to anything else. The adjective spatial means ‘spatial’ or ‘for space’.
Table cash advance loans of Contents [ hide ]

World space is the relatively empty regions of the universe minus stars and the planet with the dense part of their atmosphere . Often refers Mon simply as space , particularly in relation to space . An older, slightly more accurate term is outer space (the space outside the Earth and its atmosphere).
Philosophy

Immanuel Kant considered time and space as a priori forms of intuition. We can not recognize things-in-themselves, but only things as they appear to us. Phenomena, which recognizes appear physically in space and time, but the two are not even something physical.
They are a priori conception forms, ie. that they supersede any empirical cognition, because they simply represent the shape of our perception . Another way of saying it is that they are transcendental categories, ie. recognition conditions, ie they are necessary for recognition at all, but they can not even recognize hcg diet plan (But we’re talking about them, so our knowledge of them must be in a gray area).
Physics

In classical mechanics represents space the three-dimensional Euclidean space , in which objects may be located at three coordinates , usually represented by ( x , y , z ). In general relativity is room nothing in itself, but part of the four-dimensional spacetime .
Mathematics

In elementary geometry is the room also the usual three-dimensional Euclidean space . However, other geometric objects called compartments , and more abstract talk about such vector spaces and topological spaces . Several special cases of the latter have special names, such as Hilbert spaces .

Space (concept)
For items uses, see space .

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If you have books or articles or reference if you know of quality websites on the topic discussed here, thank you for giving complete article useful references to its verifiability and linking them to the section “Notes and references ” . ( Amend section )
The space is primarily a concept of geometry and physics , which means an extended abstract or otherwise, or the perception of this area. Conceptually, it is synonymous containing indeterminate edges.
But space takes many precise meaning and own multiple scientific disciplines derived from the geometry. The space then appears, in general, t shirt printing an All set-but structured: the area of work .
We still speak of space to designate a certain distance ( the space between two people ), a certain area ( the park covers a considerable space ) or a certain volume ( the closet occupies a large space ).
Summary

The word comes from Latin spatium, which has the same meaning as in French. In Old and Middle French, rather a space meant time, duration: the sun occupied the entire space of the day .
Geometry

The space is primarily a concept of geometry . For a long time (and still in pure geometry ), the Surveyor clung to conceptualize space (three dimensional) sensitive (that is to say the area of the astronomer ). This space has the basic components: the point , the right and the plan . He was first Euclidean until the invention of non-Euclidean geometries . In all cases, the Euclidean space retains a small-scale appearance.
Moreover, the analytic geometry introduced the notion of dimension of space, and developed a multi-dimensional geometry (finite dimensional and infinite).
Finally, modern geometry has been enriched by the topology and can now be fully qualified for space science .
Various disciplines derived from the geometry, as in physics as in mathematics, to give “their space” a more particular sense:
Physics

In physics , the notion of space (and how it is mathematically modeled) varies depending on experimental conditions:
In classical mechanics , whose laws explain almost all the phenomena occurring on a human scale, space is modeled as a Euclidean space of dimension 3.
The special relativity , whose laws take into account that the speed of light is constant regardless of the observer, introduced a link between space and time. The spacetime is modeled as a Minkowski space . These laws apply only in a limited (no acceleration of the repository, no gravity).
In general relativity , which extends the mechanical classical incorporating the fact that the speed of light by excluding the absolute nature of time is a constant, space, matter and time are related. The space-time is modeled mathematically as a variety of dimension 4, the curvature of which depends on the gravitational potential. The tangent space (approximation of the space over small distances and small times, ignoring the curvature) is a Minkowski space . The predictions of general relativity do not deviate significantly from predictions of classical mechanics to the extremely strong gravitational fields, or at extremely high speeds.
In quantum mechanics , which studies the phenomena at sizes so small that state changes are not continuous but are jump (quanta), the space is modeled as a Euclidean space of dimension 3, but the notion position no longer exists, and is replaced by the notion of wave function or probability cloud. Position and movement are linked by the Heisenberg uncertainty principle , which postulates that they can not simultaneously be known with precision, making impossible any notion of trajectory of a particle. Although effective in predicting the phenomena, this model poses problems of interpretation (eg School of Copenhagen ). For calculations, quantum mechanics does not consider the position of the studied system, but his condition. The states of the systems are modeled mathematically in a Hilbert space . In this area too, the movement (state changes) are discontinuous.
The physical space, or space-time , raises several questions philosophical :
Is space absolute or relative? In other words, as would happen if we pushed the entire universe of three meters in one direction? In physics, spacetime is relative, and a major theoretical result ( Noether’s theorem ) shows that explains the laws of conservation of momentum and of energy .
The space he has a geometry own or the geometry of space is it just a convention?
The question of the characteristics of the space had been approached by
Isaac Newton (space is absolute),
Gottfried Leibniz (space is relative)
Henri Poincare (the geometry of space is a convention)
Andy Godmiead (the will of spatial change is relative).
Mathematics

In mathematics , a space is a set equipped with additional structures remarkable, allowing them to define objects similar to those of the geometry usual. Items can be called as the context points , vectors , functions , … Here are some examples.
A topological space is a set with a very general structure (topology), which defines the notion of neighborhood of a point. This structure provides the language to define the notions of continuity and limits.
A metric space is a topological space whose topology is defined by a distance . The latter allows to estimate the size of a set ( diameter ), the proximity to a point, etc..
A uniform space is a topological space whose topology is defined by a set of finite differences (over a condition of separation). The uniform spaces include the topological groups .
A vector space is a set whose elements, vectors , can add up and be multiplied by scalars. On a given body, vector spaces are classified by their size , by definition the cardinal of any basis. An affine space is informally a vector space for which the position of the zero vector has been forgotten. This structure allows us to speak of linearity.
A set with both a vector space structure and a structure of topological space, compatible with each other in a certain sense, is called a topological vector space .
A normed vector space is a topological vector space in which one has a notion of length of a vector, a standard, making it especially a metric space. But certain metrizable topological vector spaces are provided without their topology can be defined by a standard.
A locally convex topological vector space is a topological vector space for which the topology is defined by a set of semi-standards.
A Minkowski space is a vector space of dimension 4, provided with an inner product (multiplication between vector), signature (+, -, -, -). This inner product defines the notion of orthogonality. Interpreted as a distance at a given point (although this is not a distance in the mathematical sense), this product separates the internal space into two parts: the space of points for which there is a distance, and space points ‘inaccessible’. Interpreted within the framework of special relativity, the space-time points (position, date) inaccessible are those that can not be achieved without exceeding the speed of light .
A symplectic vector space is a finite dimensional vector space, equipped with a bilinear form antisymmetric and nondegenerate.
In probability theory (but also in decision theory ), the space of elementary events is called the universe . That is, somehow, the workspace. The universe with a measure of a tribe as a probability space .
Theory of knowledge

See detailed article Theory of Knowledge .
Space is the form of our experience sensitive. This is an ideal, that is to say a structure of the mind , which contains our perceptions and where we locate the movement and body . In everyday experience, space is homogeneous, isotropic, continuous and unlimited.
We distinguish the psychological space and space mathematics . The psychological space can be divided into spaces visual, tactile, muscular, etc..
Bergson’s terminology

Henri Bergson defines the space in his works as all distances between points therein . This personal definition is challenged by Bertrand Russell who sees only a bad method for discovering properties certainly surprising, but that does not apply to space in our sense in everyday life to the word.

Space (physical)
For other uses of this term, see Space .
The physical space is the space where the objects and events that are occurring relative position and direction. 1 Physical space is usually designed with three -dimensional linear , although physicists usually consider it modern, with time , as part of a continuous infinite known as four-dimensional space-time , which in the presence of material is curved . In mathematics examines spaces with different numbers of dimensions and with different underlying structures. The concept of space is considered fundamental to an understanding of the universe even if continuous physical disagreement among philosophers about whether it is an entity, a relationship between entities, or part of a conceptual framework .
Many of these philosophical questions arose in the seventeenth century, Relevant Life Policy during the early development of classical mechanics . According to Isaac Newton , space was absolute in the sense that there was permanent and independent of matter. 2 In contrast, natural philosophers such as Gottfried Leibniz , thought the space was a collection of relationships between objects, given by its distance and direction from another. In the eighteenth century, Immanuel Kant described space and time as elements of a systematic framework which humans use to structure their experiences.
In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries mathematicians began to examine the non-Euclidean geometry , which can be said that space is curved rather than flat . According to the general theory of relativity of Albert Einstein space around gravitational fields deviates from Euclidean space . 3 Tests of general relativity have confirmed that non-Euclidean space provides a better model for the shape of space.
Content [ hide ]
1 Philosophy of space
1.1 Leibniz and Newton
1.2 Kant
1.3 Euclidean Geometry not
1.4 Gauss and Poincare
1.5 Einstein
2 Mathematics
2.1 Geometry
2.2 Vector Spaces
3 Physics
3.1 Classical mechanics
3.2 Astronomy
3.3 Relativity
3.4 Cosmology
3.5 Measuring spatial
4 Geography
5 Psychology
6 See also
7 References
7.1 Footnotes
Philosophy of space

Leibniz and Newton

Gottfried Leibniz .
In the seventeenth century, the philosophy of space and time emerged as a central item in epistemology and metaphysics . At its heart, Gottfried Leibniz , German philosopher and mathematician, and Isaac Newton , English physicist and mathematician, developed two conflicting theories of what is space. Instead of being an entity that exists independently of and over the matter, Leibniz argued that space is nothing but a collection of spatial relationships between objects in the world: ” That Which is space results from places taken together “. 4 The unoccupied regions are those that could have objects in them, and so spatial relationships with other places. For Leibniz, however, space was an abstract idealized relations between individual entities or their possible locations and then would not be continuous but discrete . 5
The space might be thought similar to the relationships between family members. Although people of a family are related, relationships do not exist independently of people. 6 Leibniz argued that space could not exist independently of objects in the world because that would imply a difference between two universes exactly alike except for the location the material world in each universe. But there would be no way to distinguish between them because, under the principle of identity of indiscernibles , there would be no real difference between them. According to the principle of sufficient reason , any theory of space involving the possibility of these two universes, would be incorrect. 7

Isaac Newton .
Newton took space as more than relations between material objects and based their position on the observation and experimentation . For a relativistic may be no difference between inertial motion , in which the objects Chrome Wire Shelving travel at a speed constant, non-inertial motion , in which the velocity changes with time, since all spatial measurements are related to other objects and their movements. But Newton argued that since no motion generates inertial forces , it must be absolute. 8 He used the example of turning water into a bucket to prove his argument. The water in a bucket of a rope hanging position to turn, starting with a flat surface. After a time, as the hub is rotating, the surface becomes concave. If the rotation of the bucket is stopped, then the water surface remains concave as it continues to rotate. The concave surface, therefore, it is apparently the result of relative motion between the hub and water. 9 Instead, Newton said, must be the result of non-inertial motion in relation to the space itself. For several centuries the bucket argument was decisive to show that the space must exist independently of matter.
Kant

Immanuel Kant .
In the eighteenth century German philosopher Immanuel Kant developed the theory of knowledge in which knowledge about space can be both a priori and synthetic . 10 According to Kant, knowledge about space is synthetic , in that statements about the space are not simply true by virtue of the meaning of words in the statement. In his work, Kant rejected the view that space should be a substance or relationship. In contrast, concluded that space and time are not discovered by humans to be objective characteristics of the world, but are part of an unavoidable systematic framework for organizing our experiences. 11
Geometry Non-Euclidean

The spherical geometry is similar to the elliptical geometry . On the surface of a sphere no parallel lines .
The Elements of Euclid contain five principles that are the basis of Euclidean geometry. One of them, the parallel postulate has been debated among mathematicians for centuries. It postulates that in any plane on which there is a straight line L 1 and a point P outside it L 1 , there is only one straight line L 2 on the plane passing through the point P and parallel to L 1 . Until the nineteenth century, few doubted the veracity of this postulate, despite the debate centered on whether it was necessary as an axiom, or if it was a theory that could result from the other axioms. 12 Around 1830, the Hungarian János Bolyai and the Russian Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky separately published treatises on a type of geometry that did not include the parallel postulate, called hyperbolic geometry . In this geometry, a number infinite parallel line passing through the point P . Consequently, the sum of the angles of a triangle is less than 180 or and the circumference of a circle in relation to its diameter is greater than pi . In the 1850s, Bernhard Riemann developed an equivalent theory called elliptic geometry in which parallel lines do not pass through P . In this geometry, the angles of more than 180 triangles or circles and have a ratio of circumference to diameter less than pi.
Geometry type Number of parallel Sum of angles in a triangle Ratio between the circumference and the diameter of a circle Measurement of curvature
Hyperbolic Infinite <180 or > Π <0
Euclidean 1 180 or π 0
Elliptical 0 > 180 or <Π > 0
Gauss and Poincare

Carl Friedrich Gauss .

Henri Poincare .
Although there was a prevailing Kantian consensus at the time, once the non-Euclidean geometries had been formalized, some began to wonder if the physical space is curved or not. Carl Friedrich Gauss , German mathematician, was the first to consider an investigation empirical geometrical structure of space. He thought a test of the sum of the angles of a triangle huge star and there are reports that actually conducted a test on a small scale, triangulating mountain tops in Germany. 13
Henri Poincare , French mathematician and physicist of the nineteenth century, introduced an important idea in which he attempted to demonstrate the futility of any attempt to find out what applies to space geometry by experiment. 14 In his view, scientists face a difficult situation if they are confined in the surface of a large imaginary sphere with particular properties, known as a sphere-world. In this world, the temperature usually varies in a way that all objects expand and contract at similar rates in different parts of the sphere. With proper temperature drop, if scientists try to use different yardsticks to determine the sum of the angles of a triangle, can be brought into thinking that inhabit a flat world, rather than a spherical surface. 15 In fact scientists can not determine, in principle, if they live in a flat or spherical world, said Poincaré, so does the debate over whether real space is Euclidean or not. For him, whose geometry was used to describe the space, was a matter of convention . 16 Since the Euclidean geometry is simpler than the non-Euclidean, assumed that the first always used to describe the “real” world geometry. 17
Einstein

Albert Einstein .
In 1905, Albert Einstein published a paper on a theory of special relativity , in which he proposed that space and time are combined into a single construct known as spacetime . In this theory, the speed of light in vacuum is the same for all observers, resulting in two events that appear simultaneous to an observer are not particular to another observer when both are in motion relative to one another- . Moreover, an observer will measure a moving clock run more slowly than a stationary with respect to them, and the measurements of objects tend to be reduced in the direction in which they are in motion relative to the observer.
In the next ten years Einstein worked in a general theory of relativity , which describes how gravity interacts with spacetime. Instead of viewing gravity as a force field acting in spacetime, Einstein suggested that it changes the geometric structure of it. 18 According to general theory, time slowly gear in places with lower gravitational potential and Light rays are deflected in the presence of a gravitational field. Scientists have studied the behavior of binary pulsars , confirming the predictions of Einstein’s theories and non-Euclidean geometry is usually used to describe the space-time.
Mathematics

In the mathematical modern mathematical spaces are defined as sets with some added structure. Often described as different kinds of strains , which are spaces that approximate the Euclidean space Phen375 , whose properties are defined largely by the local connection points found in each. However, there are many different mathematical objects that are called spaces. For example, the function spaces are generally not closely related to Euclidean space.
Geometry
The classical geometry was one of the first developments of mathematics that tried to capture and formalize the notion of physical space intuitva. Geometry probably originated in practical problems related to surveying .
Vector Spaces
A refinement of classical geometry was to define the existing economic structure of vector space from the particular properties of Euclidean space .
Physics

Classical Mechanics
Space is one of the few fundamental quantities of physics , in the sense that it can be defined through other fundamental physical quantities, not knowing anything more fundamental today. On the other hand, may be related to other fundamental quantities. Thus, like other fundamental quantities (like time and mass ), space can be explored through measurement and experiment.
Astronomy
Main article: Astronomy
The astronomy is the science related to the observation, analysis and measurement of objects in outer space .
Relativity
Main article: Theory of relativity
Before the work of Einstein in relativistic physics, space and time were viewed as independent dimensions. Einstein’s discoveries showed that they can be combined mathematically into an object called space-time . It turns out that the distances in space or in time separately are not invariant under the Lorentz transformation of coordinates, but distances in Minkowski space-time along space-time intervals, thus justifying the name .
In addition, time and space dimensions should not be seen as the exact equivalent in Minkowski spacetime. One can move freely in space but not in time. Thus, time and space coordinates are treated differently in special relativity (where time is sometimes considered a coordinate imaginary ) and general relativity (which are used for different spatial and temporal components of the metric the space-time ).
Furthermore, the theory of general relativity Einstein postulated that space-time is geometrically distorted ( curved ) near gravitationally significant masses. 19
Experiments are underway to attempt to directly measure gravitational waves . This is essentially solutions to the equations of general relativity, which describes the space-time waves in motion. This indirect evidence has been found the movement of binary systems Hulse-Taylor .
Cosmology
Main article: Shape of the Universe
The theory of relativity leads to the question cosmological what the shape of the universe and where it came from space. It seems that the space was created in the Big Bang and has expanded ever since. The general form of space is not known, it is known that space expanded very rapidly due to cosmic inflation . Alan Guth known for his theory of inflation, the first ideas presented at a seminar at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center on 23 January 1980.
Measurement Space
Main article: Measurement
The measurement of physical space has been important for a long time. Although earlier societies had developed measuring systems, the International System of Units (SI), is now the most commonly used in the measurement of space, and is almost universally used within science .
Currently, the standard space interval, called a standard meter or simply meter , is defined as the distance traveled by light in vacuum during an interval of exactly 1/299792458 of a second. This definition, along with the current definition of the second , is based on the theory of special relativity in which the speed of light plays the role of a fundamental constant of nature.
Geography

The geography is the branch of science relating to the identification and description of the Earth , utilizing spatial awareness to try to understand why things exist in specific locations. The mapping is the assignment of spaces to allow better navigation, for visualization purposes and to act as a tracking device. Statistical concepts used geostatistics to spatial data collection in order to create an estimate of the observed phenomena.
The geographical area is commonly regarded as the land may be appropriate (in which case it is seen as property , plot or land ). While some cultures base their laws on private ownership of space, other approaches are identified with communal ownership of land, while some others, such as Australian Aborigines , rather than treat land as property, invert the relationship and are considered property of the land they inhabit.
Ownership of space is not restricted to land. Ownership of airspace and international waters is decided internationally. Other property have recently been established to other spaces, for example, frequency bands of radio of the electromagnetic spectrum or cyberspace .
The public space is the place where any person has the right to move, as opposed to private spaces, where the passage may be restricted, usually by criteria of private property , government or other reserve. Therefore, this space is public property , ownership and public use.
Psychology

The psychologists first began to study how we perceive the space in the middle of the nineteenth century. Everything about these studies is now a branch of psychology . Psychologists analyzing the perception of space in relation to how we recognize or perceive a physical object interactions.
Specialized studies include amodal perception and object permanence. The perception of surroundings is important due to its necessary relevance to survival, especially with regard to hunting and self-preservation and to the idea of personal space .
Found phobias related to space, including agoraphobia (fear of open spaces), the astrofobia (the fear of celestial space) and claustrophobia (fear of enclosed spaces).

The International Space Station ( ISS ) (in English , International Space Station or ISS ), also known as the International Space Station is a research center built in Denver Divorce Attorney Earth orbit. The project involves five space agencies: the NASA , the Russian Federal Space Agency , the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency , the Canadian Space Agency and European Space Agency (ESA). 2 is considered one of the greatest achievements of the engineering .
The Brazilian Space Agency participates through a separate contract with NASA. The Italian Space Agency similarly has separate contracts for various activities not done within the framework of ESA’s work on the ISS (which involved Italy also fully).
The space station is located in orbit around the Earth at an altitude of approximately 360 kilometers, a type of low-Earth orbit. The actual height varies over time for several kilometers due to atmospheric drag and propulsion repeated. Make an orbit around the Earth in a period of about 92 minutes before June 2005 had completed over 37,500 orbits since the launch of the Zarya module on November 20, 1998.
In many ways the ISS represents a merger of previously planned space stations: the Mir-2 in Russia, the U.S. space station Freedom, the planned European Columbus module and the JEM (Japanese Experiment Module).antrix corporation limited
Thanks to the ISS, there is a permanent human presence in space, because there has always been at least two people aboard the ISS since the first permanent crew entered it on November 2, 2000. The station is maintained primarily by the launch today Russian Soyuz spacecraft and Progress , and in the past thanks to the Space Shuttle Americans until 2011, since the program space shuttle United States has been canceled before their exorbitant costs to help cut costs the U.S. government. The ISS is, as of August 2011 fully completed, and its recent construction work developed in 2010. In its early days, the station had a capacity for a crew of three astronauts , but since the arrival of the Expedition 20 , was ready to support a crew of six astronauts. Before the arrival of the German astronaut Thomas Reiter , the ESA , which joins the team of Expedition 13 in July 2006, all permanent astronauts belonged to the Russian space program, American or Canadian. The ISS, however, has been visited by astronauts from sixteen countries and was also the destination of the first six space tourists .
Content [ hide ]
1 Features
1.1 Summary of Features to 2010
2 History
3 Participating Countries
3.1 USA
3.2 Russia
3.3 Europe
3.4 Canada
3.5 Japan
3.6 Italy
3.7 Brazil
4 Modules
4.1 Currently in the International Space Station
4.1.1 Unity Node
4.1.2 Structure of an integrated framework (ITS)
4.1.3 Zarya
4.1.4 Zvezda
4.1.5 Destiny
4.1.6 Camera Pirs
4.1.7 Harmony (Node 2)
4.1.8 Columbus
4.1.9 Kibo (JEM)
4.1.10 Mini-Research Module 2
4.1.11 Tranquility (Node 3)
4.1.12 Dome
4.2 Future components
4.2.1 Mini-Research chiropractic marketing Module 1
4.2.2 Multipurpose Laboratory Module
4.2.3 Load Module port
5 Robotic Arm
5.1 Canadarm 2
5.2 European Robotic Arm (ERA)
6 transport vehicles
6.1 Unmanned
6.1.1 Space Shuttle
6.1.2 Soyuz
6.2 Unmanned
6.2.1 Progress
6.2.2 ATV
6.2.3 HTV
7 ISS Expeditions
8 Costs
8.1 NASA
8.2 FKA
8.3 ESA
8.4 JAXA
8.5 CSA
9 Space Tourism
10 Incidents
11 See also
12 References
13 External links
Features

Schematic assembly of the ISS.
In general, we can say that the International Space Station is a giant Meccano set in orbit around the Earth at 386 km, about 108 m in length over 88 m in width and a mass of approximately 415 tons when completed in 2010 . Living With a volume of about 938 m fender flares 3 , exceed in complexity, and by far, all that was conceived to date. You can permanently accommodate seven astronauts who will be going and relate according to the demands of the missions. Your energy will be provided by solar panels largest ever built, with a power of 110 kW.
Summary of Features to 2010
Width : 108 m
Length : 74 m
Mass : 420 t
Number of people who will man : 6 in principle
Laboratories : 4 for the moment
Living space : 1,200 m³
Speed ​​: 29,000 km / h
History

The International Space Station against the blackness of space and the thin line of the atmosphere of the Earth . Image taken from the Space Shuttle Discovery before the two spacecraft iniciasen separation.
The history of the ISS began on November 20, 1998, when the Russian rocket Proton placed in orbit on Russian module Zarya , the leading and largest model, designed Bankruptcy to equip the space station’s initial propulsion and power. Months later, NASA put in orbit by the Unity node of the space shuttle Endeavour . 3

Solar panels on the International Space Station.
On July 12, 2000 was added the second Russian service module Zvezda (pronounced / zviozda / ) which provided the life support systems of the Space Station and preparing the station to receive its first astronauts. On October 11, 2000 was added on the Unity node Z1 STI integrated structure enabling communication with the Earth . On November 2, arrive first crew aboard a Soyuz launched on October 31, 2000. A month after the first module was added which provided photovoltaic solar energy all season.
The following year came to the space station lab more importantly, the Destiny , American-made. It was docked at the station on February 7, 2001 by the shuttle Atlantis . On April 19, 2001 was placed on the first arm of the ISS, Canadian manufacturing. With the SSRMS arm also got a small Italian module and antenna UHF . On 12 July the same year he added a decompression chamber for the crew could leave the space station and take the first spacewalks. On 14 September 2001 added a Russian docking module with a decompression chamber.
On April 8, 2002 was coupled central segment of the future ITS S0 frame of 91 meters that will support large solar panels on the ends of the ISS. The Canadian SSRMS arm was placed in the Destiny module was transferred to the central segment S0 ITS on 5 June of that year. On October 7, was placed on the starboard ITS S1 segment of the frame of the station. The main frame was completed on November 23, 2002 with the STI port P1 segment.
On February 27, 2004, the crew Michael Foale and Alexander Kaleri conducted the first spacewalk involving the entire crew. Most of the objectives of the ride, including the installation of external equipment, were achieved before the mission was aborted due to a cooling problem in the HL Kalery suit.
On July 28, 2005 arrived at the station module load Italian Raffaello through the space shuttle Discovery from NASA.
On June 27, 2006 a piece of space junk that was later identified as the U.S. military satellite Hitch Hiker one released in 1963 and now out of service, spent about 2 kilometers from the ISS (it moves about 7.7 km / s). This event triggered an alarm and began preparations for an emergency evacuation of the space station. This approach was monitored by technicians CCVE Russian and the Center for NASA in Houston , and concluded without incident. It was felt that the piece of space junk had a mass of 79 kilos.
On July 7, 2006 the shuttle Discovery docked with the ISS successfully. Among the crew of Discovery was the German astronaut Thomas Reiter who along with American Jeff Williams and Russian Pavel Vinogradov are permanent crew of the orbiting complex. With the advent of astronaut ESA station moves from a permanent crew of two astronauts to three.

The International Space Station and Space Shuttle Discovery ready for mating.
On June 8, 2007, the shuttle Atlantis (mission STS-117 ) part to the International Space Station to install a new solar panels four task performed successfully. On day 10 detected a crack in the thermal cover shuttle Atlantis to be repaired in flight. 5 On day 14 there is a serious computer failure left without water, light and guidance capability to the space station. In the worst case, it should be evicted but the bug is fixed and return systems to normal operation. 6
On June 17, 2007 astronaut Sunita Williams becomes the woman who has been followed more time in space, completing 188 days and 4 hours away from our planet. 7
On October 23, 2007 delivered the Italian-made module Harmony and restructure part Container Store of preparing for future station assembly missions. 8 with a weight close to 16 tonnes and will serve as a gateway to European and Japanese laboratories.
In February 2008 he added the Columbus module and the European space shuttle Discovery in June again visited the ISS and added new components, which highlights the expected Kibo Science Laboratory.
On March 15, 2009 were added four sets of solar arrays to denver auto accident lawyer the station to accommodate more crew inside.
Participating Countries

United States

U.S. space agency by its government, the NASA , is the initiator of the project and responsible for their development. The main construction company is the group Boeing Space and material participation includes the main structure (the structure that links the station with the large end panels), four pairs of solar panels, three modules that make up the node 1 (Unity) connection that includes cameras for spacecraft docking and other minor elements. It also manufactures breathing air tanks that will supply both the housing modules and service modules both Americans and Russians. NASA also provides the module housing, the Destiny laboratory module and connection to the centrifuge. The logistics under the responsibility of NASA includes electrical power, communications and data processing, thermal control, environmental control and maintenance of habitable health of the crew. 9 The gyroscope on the ISS are also under its responsibility.

Primary contributors.
Countries under contract with NASA .
Russia

The Russian Federal Space Agency (FKA) provides about one third the mass of the ISS, with the participation of its main businesses: Rocket Space Corporation-Energy and Krunitchev Space Center. The Russian agency has provided a service module habitable, which was first occupied by a crew member, a universal docking bay that allows the coupling of both U.S. ships (space shuttle) and Russia (Soyuz), and several modules research. Russia also is involved enough in providing the station and to maintain them in orbit, using, in particular food supply ship Progress. The Russian Zarya control module was the first item to put in orbit.
Russia also provides KURS system approach to the ISS, which was used successfully in the MIR station. 10
Europe

Most member states of ESA are working on the ISS, in particular by providing the COF (Columbus Orbital Facility, simply called Columbus) module that can receive 10 pallets of tools, half European, and the ATV ( Automated Transfer Vehicle ) vehicle to bring supplies to the orbiting complex. The ESA is also responsible for European manipulator arm, to be used from the Russian scientific and logistic platforms and data management systems of the service module. Not forgetting the launchers Ariane 5 , which will be used to supply the ISS fuel and material through the ATC.
Canada

The Canadian Space Agency assumes SSRMS embodiment of the robotic arm, also called Canadarm, a single device intended to provide the assembly and maintenance of the station. Canada also provides the SVS (Space Vision System), a camera system that has been tried on the manipulator arm of the U.S. space shuttle designed to assist astronauts responsible for your use and vital tool for maintaining the station.
Japan

The JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) provides the JEM (Japanese Experiment Module), which houses several pressurized compartments habitable, a platform 10 pallets of tools may be exposed to space vacuum and a specific manipulator arm. The pressure module can in turn also receive 10 pallets of tools and others.
The following countries are merely collaborators:
Italy

Regardless of their participation in the ESA, ASI ( Italian Space Agency ) provides three multi-purpose logistics modules. Designed to integrate the cellar of the American shuttle, involving pressurized compartments and bring various instruments and experiments aboard the ISS. The conception of the European Columbus module draws plenty of these three elements. ASI also provides nodes 2 and 3 of the station.
Brazil

Under the direction of the Brazilian Space Agency , the National Institute for Space Research provides an instrument panel and fixing system which will host several experiments to the station. Carried by a shuttle, the panel is intended to expose the void space for a long period.
Modules

Currently in the International Space Station
Unity Node
Main article: Unity Node

Connection modules of the ISS Unity (NASA).
Node 1 (Unity or node) is the gallery of a length of about 6.5 m and 5.5 m in diameter that connects the living and working areas of the ISS. 11 In addition to its connection to Zarya, the node serves connection with the U.S. Destiny module, the accommodation and the watertight compartment Pirs.
The essential elements such as liquids, and the control of life support, electrical systems and data must pass through the node strength, since it connects the living and work areas. They settled in more than 50,000 mechanical items, 216 transmission lines and gas liquids and 121 internal and external electrical cables, employing more than 10 kilometers of cable.
It was built in Huntsville, Alabama and the main installation of hardware in the Unity was completed in June 1997 at the Marshall Space Flight Center of NASA. It was launched aboard the shuttle Endeavour on Dec. 4, 1998. The Unity was joined to Zarya control module in the course of three spacewalks performed during the seventh day of Endeavour’s mission.
Structure of integrated frame (ITS)
Main article: Structure of an integrated framework
This aluminum frame forms the backbone of the International Space Station. ITS (Integrated Truss Structure) supports the ISS radiators, the giant solar panels end, the Canadian arm of the mobile structure and other equipment. 12
NASA initially designed this structure to support eight large solar panels, four and two smaller radiators for Space Station Freedom. The station was canceled for lack of funds. After signing the agreement to create an international station NASA took the initial design of the structure of the Freedom and applied it to the ISS with minor modifications.
In 1991 he completed the design of the structure to be sent by dividing parties in the hold of the shuttle. Divided into five segments, this structure was completed in 2007 assembly.
Zaryaantrix corporation limited

The Zarya module became the first piece of the ISS in 1998.
Main article: Zarya
The module Zarya Functional Cargo Block also named and by the Russian acronym FGB, was the first component launched for the international space station. This module was designed to provide the propulsion and the initial energy of the orbital complex. The 19,323 kg pressurized module was launched on a Russian Proton rocket in November 1998. 13
The Zarya was funded by the U.S. and built by Russia. Its name means “sunrise” in Russian. It is a U.S. component of the station, even if built and launched by Russia. The module was built at the Centre for Research and Production cheap auto insurance quotes Space Center Khrunichev State Research and also known as KhSC, located in Moscow under subcontract from the Boeing Company for NASA.
The Zarya module is 12.6 meters long and 4.1 meters at its widest point. Has an operational life estimate of at least 15 years. Its solar panels and six nickel-cadmium batteries can provide an average of 3 kW of electric current. His side hatches allow the coupling of the Russian spacecraft Soyuz and Progress supply ships.
Zvezda
Main article: Zvezda Service Module

Zviozda module.
The Zvezda service module (to be read / zviozda / ) was the first fully Russian contribution to the International Space Station and served as the early cornerstone for the first human habitation of the station. The module provides the first dwellings of the season, life support systems, power distribution, data processing system, flight control system and propulsion system. It also provides a communications system that includes capabilities for command as regular flight. Although many of these systems are being replaced or supplemented by the U.S. components of the station, the service module Zviozda will always remain the structural and functional center of the Russian segment of International Space Station. 14
Destiny
Main article: Destiny Laboratory

The Destiny held by the arm of the shuttle Atlantis.
The Destiny is the primary research laboratory, supports a wide range of experiments and studies that seek to contribute to the health, safety and quality of life for people worldwide. The laboratory of the station offers researchers a unique opportunity to test physical processes in the absence of gravity. The aim of the experiments in this laboratory is to allow scientists to better understand the Earth and prepare for future missions to the Moon and Mars .
Space shuttle Atlantis docked with the space laboratory U.S. arm is at the station on February 8, 2001. They had to perform three spacewalks to activate it.
The laboratory was designed to support modular shelf systems that could be added, removing or replacing as necessary. They may contain fluid and electrical connectors, video equipment, sensors, controllers and humidifiers movement to support any experiment that is contained in them. 15
When he reached the station, contained five shelves Destiny electrical and life support systems. The following shuttle missions have delivered more racks and experiment facilities, including the Microgravity Science Glovebox, the Human Research Facility and five shelves to carry out various scientific experiments.
Destiny eventually will support 13 shelves loaded with scientific experiments on human life, new materials research, Earth observations and commercial uses. Before the season is complete, the Destiny will be assembled with the modules, laboratories, Kobi, NASA and the Columbus, ESA. In addition to its role as a laboratory scientist, Destiny also contains the control center for robotic arm operations of the station.
Chamber Pirs
Main article: House Pirs

House Pirs.
The compartment or Pirs airlock hatch has two outputs for extravehicular, and two coupling systems, one for binding to the Zviozda, and another at the opposite end, for Soyuz and Progress. 16
Manufactured by Russia S. P. Korolev RSC Energia, is used as the Pirs docking port for additional Soyuz and Progress vehicles, the module Zviozda. Also serves as lock-tight to allow the exit of cosmonauts outside the complex so that it can perform spacewalks from the station.
A Russian Progress cargo ship that was modified was the September 17, 2001 the Pirs module of ISS. The Progress vehicle used 870 kg of propellant transported and 800 kg of various charges, including his own Pirs, and materials and other scientists.
After several spacewalks the Pirs was perfectly assembled at the orbiting complex.
Harmony (Node 2)
Main article: Harmony (Node 2)

Harmony (Node 2) .
The Harmony , formerly known as Node 2, launched on mission STS-120 17 was docked to the International Space Station on November 14, 2007. 18
It was commissioned to the Italian firm Thales Alenia Space , and built in Turin . 19 ESA gave the property to NASA in 2003. 20
is a life support module, providing oxygen , electricity , water and other systems necessary for the proper development of the stay of astronauts. It also has the capacity to house two bedrooms for the six possible crew of the IIS. 21 Harmony will also serve as connection point for the European module Columbus and the Japanese laboratory Kibo 22
Columbus

The Columbus at Kennedy Space Center being prepared for launch.
Main article: Columbus Module
This laboratory is a cylindrical module similar in form to multifunctional logistics module. The module contains 10 shelves ISPR (International Standard Shelves Payload). There are 4 of them in the front, 4 side and 2 on the roof. The remaining 3 are equipped with life support systems. There are 4 shelves that can be placed with experiments in the external panels for submission to the vacuum of space. These panels are located above and below the hatch.
The laboratory has a length of 6.87 m, a diameter of 4.49 m and a gross weight of 10.3 tons , which can reach up to 19.3 t when the laboratory is at maximum capacity.
The Columbus dates back to 1985 when ESA approved the program of the same name. The program aimed to create a European space station, accompanied by Hermes (a draft European mini-ship). The project included an experimental platform for unmanned flight, an attached pressurized module (APM) and a communications satellite with willingness to share data between it and the Earth. The final decision was to include the Columbus International Space Station due to some budget cuts. The entire project dui lawyer chicago created for a European space station remained only the APM, renamed Columbus Orbital Facility or commonly known as Columbus. 23
Its expected lifetime is 10 years.
Kibo (JEM)

Kibo Pressurized Module along with the rest of Japanese participation in the space station.
Main article: Kibo
The JEM (Japanese experimental module)-called in Japanese Kibo ( 希望 Kibo ? ) , which means “hope” – is the first complex living space and makes Japan unique research capabilities of the International Space Station.
In the Kibo experiments are performed in the areas of space medicine, biology, Earth observations, material production, biotechnology and communications research. Experiments and Kibo systems operating in space station operations from the control room of the mission, or SSOF in Tsukuba Space Center in Ibaraki Prefecture , Japan.
The Kibo pressurized module was manufactured in Nagoya and is 11.2 meters long. Kibo consists of several components: two research facilities, the Pressurized Module and Exposed Facility, Storage Bins will carry a logistics module attached to car shipping each one of them, a remote handling system, and a unit of the communication system of inter -órbita.espacial. 24
Was attached to the International Space Station through the flight STS-123 STS-124 and STS-127 . The installation was completed in June 2008. His point of connection with the ISS is the module Harmony .
Mini-Research Module 2
Main article: Mini-research module 2
Released: November 10, 2009 with the Soyuz FG .
The Russian component to the ISS, MRM2 be used for the berthing of vessels in denver martial arts the Soyuz and Progress, as an airlock for spacewalks, and as an interface for scientific experiments.
Tranquility (Node 3)

Node 3 Tranquility.
Main article: Tranquility (Node 3)
The last of the nodes in the United States station. Tranquility node contains an advanced life support system to recycle wastewater from the crew and generate oxygen for the crew to breathe. The module has six berths, however four of those locations are disabled as the modules that were planned initially added to Tranquility were canceled. As with the Harmony module (Node 2) was built in Italy but by ESA contract with NASA, remain the property of the latter. It is used as cargo, as his previous role was related to the module housing 25 and the Crew Return Vehicle (vehicle crew return), which were canceled in 2001 and 2002 respectively. 26 was released in February 2010 with the Space Shuttle Endeavour as part of mission STS-130 .
Dome

Dome of the ISS.
Main article: Cupola (ISS)
The Cupola module 27 is designed to be a monitoring and control tower of the space station. Named for its dome shape has seven windows that provide an overview to the crew to observe and conduct operations outside the station.
The module will control workstations and other hardware, as the station’s robotic arm and can communicate with other members in other parts of the station or outside during spacewalks. The dome will also be used as an observatory of the Earth.
The dome is the result of a bilateral exchange agreement between the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA. The ESA, in charge of its construction, the company hired Alenia Spazio as prime contractor and coordinated with six other European firms: APCO ( Switzerland ), EADS Space Transportation ( Germany ), HOUSE ( Spain ), SAAB Ericsson and Lindholmen Development ( Sweden ) and Verhaert ( Belgium ) 28
This module was stored in the Kennedy Space Center until his release in February 2010 with the Space Shuttle Endeavour as part of mission STS-130 .
Future components
Arranged chronologically planned launch.
Mini-Research Module 1
Main article: Mini-research module 1
Released: May 2010 with the space shuttle Atlantis ‘s STS-132 .
MRM1 be used to store the charge for connection to board the ISS.
Multipurpose Laboratory Module
Main article: Multipurpose Laboratory Module

Multipurpose Laboratory Module.
Released: December 2011 with the rocket Proton-M .
The Russian Space Agency has announced it will launch in 2011, by a rocket-type Proton MLM (Multipurpose Laboratory Module.) 29 This module will be most important for Russia to put into orbit for scientific purposes in the International Space Station. Depending on your actual date may be the third or fourth dedicated module on the ISS for scientific research. This module will equip an altitude control system which may be used if needed members of the Station and will be docked in the docking port of module Zviozda . The European Robotic Arm will be released alongside this laboratory by the agreement signed in 2005 ESA and Roskosmos.
Load Module port
The assembly plan envisaged a Russian research module or MRI, but this was canceled because of problems in 2007 30 and instead decided to send the load port module will be assembled at the International Space Station through the mission STS-131 dated scheduled for 2010. 31 Among the functions performed include:
Function as berth for ships Soyuz
Loading module
Bring spare parts and new parts like a radiator for MLM (570 kg) and joint replacement section of the European ERA (150 kilograms) among others.
Robotic Arm

Canadarm 2
Main article: Canadarm 2

The Canadarm2 on the ISS.
The Canadarm2 is a manufacturing arm Canadian who also has an exceptional size and weight, unique features that put it far ahead of his older brother and the space shuttle. 32
It has 17.6 meters long (2.6 meters higher than the ferry) and is four times more light (1800 kg against 410). It is not really an arm but two that has a clever hand at each end. 33
The Canadarm2 may or may not have a base, as required, and it can be either hand. Each of these hands can hold some special steps to be placed in strategic points of the ISS and that will provide power, data and video connections. Grasping and letting go of these steps in coordination, as does a monkey to move from branch to branch, the robot will be able to move from one extreme to another and get to the ISS where it requires such delicate tasks as plug connectors, or as heavy as help engage the space shuttle.
Another of its virtues is brute force. The Canadarm2 is capable of handling volumes and rail cars up to 116 tons.
The new arm was released in June 2001, when the Atlantis brought the Quest airlock for spacewalks from the ISS, the Canadarm2 helped put the camera in place.
This is only the first part of the Mobile Servicing System on Space Station (SSRMS). The second part is the Mobile Base System, the size of a truck, will move on rails to bring the Canadian arm quickly from one extreme to another in the space station. The third and final part is the Special Purpose Manipulator Business. It is an intelligent hand equipped with lights, cameras and tools storeroom may install and replace batteries, power supplies and computers to delicate.antrix corporation limited
The Canadarm2 is controlled from the laboratory Destiny and the astronauts who operate it will be supported by two sub control on Earth, one in Houston (USA.) and one in Quebec (Canada), which are able to impart orders extras in case necessary.
European Robotic Arm (ERA)
Main article: European Robotic Arm
The European Robotic Arm (European Robotic Arm) used to install and replace solar panels, review and assemble modules and to transport astronauts performing spacewalks.
It measures about 11.3 m long and weighs 630 kg and is able to move up to 8000 kilograms . Apparently it’s almost like a human arm, with joints and the ability to grip, hold and turn as if it were a real hand. Is symmetrical in its construction. 34
The arm can be directed from outside, through a panel, or from a control room inside the ISS Dome named for its shape and that through its seven windows allow astronauts see all arm movements robotic.
It was released in 2009. 35
Transport Vehicles

To transport astronauts and supplies and for construction of the ISS itself, each participant space agency has a transport vehicle. These vehicles can be divided into manned and unmanned.
Manned
With the departure of NASA’s Space Shuttle service, only Russia has a manned space program applicable to the ISS. The astronauts of other nationalities rely on Russian Soyuz vehicles to reach the orbiting complex.

Landing the space shuttle Atlantis .
Space Shuttle
Main article: Space Shuttle Program

The Soyuz TMA-6 approaching the International Space Station in 2005.
The U.S. space shuttle was in charge until July 2011, the station assembly and transport astronauts (seven) and heavy groceries to her.
Soyuz
Main article: Soyuz
The Soyuz was the ship that brought the first inhabitants of the ISS. He keeps the permanent crew of the space station carrying three astronauts. Serves as emergency ship if the ISS should be evacuated as each remains attached Soyuz an average of six months on the station. Since 2002, the Soyuz TMA using specially designed for the ISS. 36
Unmanned
The space agencies of Russia, Europe and Japan, through its unmanned supply ships will be responsible for transporting supplies to the station, apart from the Chicago Criminal Lawyer Space Shuttle. So far the Russians have been doing with the Progress vehicle, and in January 2008 it replaced the European ATV, much larger, which complemented the Japanese HTV in 2009. 37
Progress
Main article: Progress

Ship Progress M
The Russian Progress spacecraft are used to carry food and fuel to the ISS. Already been used with the Salyut 6, Salyut 7 and Mir. In addition to supplies and equipment, the Progress engines used on a regular basis to raise the orbit of the station. Its design is based on the Soyuz.
ATV
Main article: Automated Transfer Vehicle
Automated Transfer Vehicle for single use, is responsible for supplying the International Space Station (ISS) and evacuate the waste. The unmanned cargo vehicle Jules Verne, built by ESA, 38 was the first of these ships, which have a greater capacity than the Progress , 39 those used by the Russian Space Agency today. Their first release was made ​​on 9 March 2008 in a rocket Ariane 5 40
HTV
Main article: Vehicle H-II Transfer
It is a contribution from the Japanese Space Agency to the international project. Transports water, supplies and experiments to the International Space Station. Although it is larger than the vessels need to be coupled Progress manually using the Canadarm2 because it has no automatic docking system. In its usual configuration the vehicle is broken into two sections: a pressurized port that connects to the nadir of Harmony, and a non-pressurized, usually for the transport of space exposure experiments for Kibo module.
Expedition to the ISS

The International Space Station is the most visited space infrastructure in the history of astronautics . To date 12 July 2006, has already had 153 visitors (not different). The MIR had 137 visitors (not different). The number of visitors than the ISS is 120.
See also: Appendix: Human space flight to the International Space Station , Annex: Unmanned Space Flight International Space Station and Annex: Visitors to the International Space Station
Costs

The estimated total costs of the ISS is 100,000 U.S. dollars (USD) 41 Give an accurate cost assessment for the ISS is, however, very complicated, it is difficult to determine what costs should be added to the program really ISS or how the Russian contribution should be measured, since the Russian space agency works with USD considerably lower than the other partners.
NASA
In contrast to common belief, most of the costs of NASA not intended initially to build the ISS modules and external structure on land or for flight crew and supplies to the ISS. In fact, the space shuttle program, which as of 2006 cost about 5000 million dollars annually, usually not considered part of the ISS budget, but the shuttles were used almost exclusively for flights to the ISS since 1998.
The budget request for NASA to the government for 2007 lists the costs for the ISS (without Shuttle costs) and 25,600 million dollars from 1994 to 2005. 42 in 2005 and 2006 were assigned to the ISS between 1700 and 1800 million every year. This amount will rise in 2010, when projected to increase to 2300 million dollars and then must remain at the same level, at least until 2016 (date of scheduled completion).
The 1800 million dollars given in 2005 are distributed in: 43
Development of hardware new : only $ 70 million were allocated to major development in the first instance to the development of navigation systems, data carriers or life.
Space Shuttle Operations : $ 800 million, divided into 125 million for each sector: software, logistics and maintenance systems and extravehicular activities. Also additional 150 million are expended for flight avionics systems and crew. The remaining $ 250 million goes to the overall maintenance of the ISS.
Launch and mission operations : while the shuttle launch costs are not considered part of the ISS budget, mission integration (300 million), medical aid (25 million) and the shuttle launch site (125 million) are within the budget of the ISS.
Integration of program operations : $ 350 million were intended to maintain and sustain U.S. flight and ground hardware and software to ensure design integrity of the ISS and the continued safe operability of the orbital complex.
Supply and crew of the ISS : only $ 140 million were earmarked for the purchase of supplies, load capacity and flight crews for Progress and Soyuz craft.
NASA projections assume average costs of 2500 million from 2011 through 2016 and the end of the money allocated to the ISS in 2017 (300 to 500 million) after falling in 2016, the total costs of ISS project for NASA since the program’s inception in 1993 until its end will be about 53,000 million dollars. The 33 shuttle flights (which, as mentioned above, usually not considered part of the total costs of the ISS) for the construction and maintenance of the ISS will be about 35,000 million dollars. There have been considerable costs to design the Space Station Freedom in the 1980s and 1990s , before the ISS program that began in 1993. Therefore, although the actual costs contributed to the ISS are only half of the 100,000 million often cited in the media, if it meets the costs of the shuttle and precursor project design, reaching almost 100,000 million expenditure dollars, only for NASA.
FKA
A considerable part of the budget of the Russian Federal Space Agency is used for the ISS. Since 1998 there have been about two dozen flights of Soyuz and Progress spacecraft. Since the disaster of the Columbia has been commissioned to relieve the permanent crew and maintain the supply of the station from 2003 to 2006. The question of how long Russia can sustain the costs of the station is difficult to answer. The two Russian modules are currently in orbit derived from the MIR program and therefore development costs are much lower than for other modules also change between the ruble and the dollar is not properly displaying a true comparison of what the real costs to Russia.
The $ 20 million each space tourist paid for a seat on the Soyuz to the ISS is offset only a small part of the Russian financial contribution to the ISS.
ESA
The ESA estimates its contribution over the course of the project life (30 years) will be 8,000 million euros. 44 Costs for the Columbus laboratory now total more than 1000 million, the costs for development of totaling several ATV hundreds of millions and the added cost of each launch of Ariane 5 reaches around 125 million, each ATV launch also add significant costs.
JAXA
The Kibo laboratory has cost 2.8 billion dollars 45 according to a recent article this year. Besides the annual costs for Kibo laboratory will add about 350 to 400 million U.S. dollars. 46
CSA
Canada, whose contribution to the ISS is the Canadarm2 to the mobile support is estimated to last 20 years have contributed to about 1400 million Canadian dollars to the ISS 47
Space Tourism

Main article: Space Tourism
Since 2008, 6 tourists have visited the ISS, the payment is made ​​by EE. States. , costs about $ 25 million. The tourists, or participants pay day loan Space were launched and returned through the rotation of the Russian crew Soyuz space missions. In addition, the ISS was the venue for the first wedding space in which the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, the Expedition 7 , married Ekaterina Dmitrieva, who was in Texas at that time. The last flight to the ISS space tourism took place in April 2009 . After that, the station will be upgraded to a permanent crew of 6, meaning that there will be seats available on the Soyuz and consequently there will be seating for Space Adventures , the company that runs the visits. [ citation needed ]
Incidents

On Thursday 12 March 2009 the PAM-D object 25 090 were on a collision course with the waste from the ISS, activating a contingency plan last minute due to the delay in detecting the event from Houston. As a precaution astronauts boarded the Russian capsule Soyuz , closing the respective gates and activating the automatic control of ISS. The Soyuz capsule remains constantly attached to the space station as a protective measure, the only means of escape in such cases. 48 On Friday, November 6, 2009 did a similar event with a smaller object to orbit but only 500 meters from the ISS. 49

Roundtable: Sourcing in the Face of a Financial Crisis

May 18th, 2012

As the financial crisis continues to grip markets and businesses worldwide, is there any clarity as to the consequences for the sourcing sector? The Shared Services & Outsourcing Network hosted a roundtable debate looking at the short- and long-term impact of the turmoil on the sourcing space; online editor Jamie Liddell was joined by some of the keenest minds in sourcing to analyse the possible repercussions, the potential winners and losers – and steps industry players can take to minimise the impact on their businesses.

Attending were:

Charles Aird
Senior Managing Director of Outsourcing/Shared Services & Offshoring
PricewaterhouseCoopers

Phil Fersht
Research Director, BPO, Offshoring & IT Services
AMR Research

Katherine Kawamoto
VP Research & Advisory Services
IACCM

Tony Rawlinson
Managing Director, Financial Services
EquaTerra

Brian D Smith
Partner & Managing Director, Financial Services
TPI

Dr. Thomas Tunstall
Advisory Liaison
ACS

SSON: Let’s kick off with the immediate future: how do you see the short-term impact of the financial crisis playing out across the outsourcing sector?

Brian Smith: I think we’ve seen we’ve seen some impact here already; people are starting to think carefully about discretionary projects, particularly in the application development space. But we’ve seen less impact on day-to-day BPO-type activity which is outsourced and offshored, I think largely because the financial crisis has had more of an impact on credit and the capital structure of organizations, and less impact at this point on operating volumes.

I think what we’re seeing is a slowdown in discretionary activity – but that will pick up again at some point as people get back to realizing their projects to execute against – and then the string of mergers that are taking place particularly here in the US as well as in Europe is obviously going to spawn a degree of activity in restructuring. I think that will impact the captive side of life; I think we’ll see more activity there. So my thought would be that we’re going to see a lull followed by a large amount of activity.

SSON: To what extent do you think the mergers that have taken place have been driven directly by the crisis rather than having already been in the works?

Brian Smith: I would say most of the big mergers that have taken place here are directly related to the financial crisis. I suspect very few, if any, were even on the cards three months ago.

Tony Rawlinson: Picking up on that, I think we see the economics at the moment both disrupting and driving outsourcing. On the one hand there’s certainly a disruption in the short term, an impact on project budgets, a deferral of capital expenditure, a deferral of all but mission-critical projects especially in financial services. Conversely our view is that the credit crunch and economic downturn mean that structurally outsourcing and offshoring are even more useful strategic tools going forward.

I’d share Brian’s view that there’s going to be a short pause before the true implications of the market crystallise, and then a forceful push for cost-reduction – but also a recognition that the winners now in recessionary times are going to turn their service delivery model into something that’s a lot more flexible. I think the winners in recessionary times will already be thinking about their sourcing strategy for what comes after the recession; the flipside of flexibility in a downturn is a need to switch on as the upcurve starts again.

SSON: You said a short pause: how long do you think that short pause is going to be?

Tony Rawlinson: I think it’s going to be market-specific; my sense is that the US is further through that process than the UK and continental Europe. Some institutions are still, frankly, focused on survival – I’m going to meetings with institutions that are clearly worried about their continued existence – but over the next month or so we should have a lot more clarity. The other interesting flavour of course in the US, the UK and increasingly in continental Europe is the impact of the virtual nationalization or semi-nationalization of some institutions; we see that potentially impacting the political attitude to offshoring at a time when offshoring is clearly going to help address the short-term cost objectives of some of these players. So there are some interesting forces at work here, some of them pulling in different directions, and I think all will become a lot clearer over the next few weeks.

Phil Fersht: There are some interesting discussion points here and I’m inclined to agree with them. We went out of our way to speak with 44 of the major US financial institutions over the last two or three weeks to really gauge what their short- and medium-term plans are with regards to embracing outsourcing, and naturally the short-term focus is very much on stability and understanding how the hell this is going to play out for them. Taking 20 or 30 per cent off the bottom line is a nice-to-have, but at this moment just knowing you’re going to be around is taking precedence. However, the way things seem to be moving, I think people are going to have a pretty strong idea in the next month about stability, about M&A – I think we’ll see a lot of the M&A start to happen in the next few weeks as this thing starts to settle down a bit – and then the process is going to move on towards further optimization in the back office, further means to find cost-containment and broader–scale strategies.

In addition to that, there’s definitely a change in mindset amongst the finance operations leaders in terms of embracing outsourcing as a strategic vehicle for longer-term plans to cut costs – and being perceived to do so. When we spoke to these institutions, 40 per cent of them said they were going to increase their spend and their impetus towards outsourcing in the next 6 months and only 15 per cent said they were going to decrease that. And when we break that down further, it’s the banking sector that has the strongest impetus to increase outsourcing; nearly half the banks – all the usual suspects going through this meltdown right now – said they were increasing their impetus towards outsourcing, and only 10 per cent were decreasing. When we get into other areas like insurance it’s a much more neutral effect; it’s definitely the banking sector that’s driving this.

When we get a bit deeper into the actual specific areas they’re looking to get quick hits from, it’s the bread-and-butter areas of outsourcing which don’t require massive amounts of upfront transformation, where they’ve already done some educational exploration and some evaluation, and it’s areas like banking BPO, application outsourcing, and F&A BPO that are clearly those that are going to offer the lower-hanging fruit opportunities. Taking the areas like core financials, core HR, bringing them out into third-party models quickly and effectively, is where we see a lot of activity in probably the middle of Q1, Q2, Q3 next year; we’re expecting to see a big spike in contracts being signed, but we don’t think they’re going to be very large contracts, we’re expecting to see a lot of small-to-medium-size contracts as companies try and move quickly into engagements that are more workable.

The short-term areas that we’re seeing a drop-off include areas like IT infrastructure. Any IT staff augmentation projects seem to be a negative right now; anything discretionary is definitely being put on the back burner; things like HR outsourcing are definitely being put on the back burner in the near-term as companies look to have quicker, more impacting areas to move into. Then when we look at the sort of 6-to-12-month timeframe, we see a much stronger bend towards things like mortgage BPO, or even HRO coming back, and areas like staff augmentation have to come into play. When you think about Wells Fargo and Wachovia merging, that’s a ton of systems integration that has to go on. Wachovia had a very broad, well-documented BPO and ITO strategy, Wells Fargo is not traditionally a big adopter of broad outsourcing, so how are these companies going to align? Which road are they going to go down? We think outsourcing is going to be one of them.

SSON: Charles, is this reflected in how your clients are approaching the crisis at the moment?

Charles Aird: I would say yes and no. I think for the traditional back office that everybody’s been talking about, the answer is yes, short-term; there’s definitely a pause, people are trying to figure out what their existence is going to be and it’s taking longer for them to make decisions. However, having said that, we do a lot of work around sourcing with clients in manufacturing, R&D, and other areas both for captive and outsourcing – and we’re not seeing a significant change for those organizations, because, as you’ll find, research shows that the US just isn’t turning out science and technology people anymore – well, I shouldn’t say that, universities are, but people are going back to India and China, to their home countries – and so we don’t have the skills in the US to do a lot of the work that needs to be done for the US economy. So outsourcing’s now embedded in organizations.

Plus we see a lot of organizations that we work with are using outsourcing as a means to penetrate markets that they haven’t been in before, particularly in developing countries; we see those things continuing. But definitely in the BPO, ITO environments – particularly over the last month or six weeks – organizations are loath to spend, so they’re looking for ways – creative ways, which I think probably helps the outsourcing service providers – to finance some of these deals, particularly the upfront part of them that deals with transition costs and may be involved with severance, consulting fees, legal fees, whatever it may be. And interestingly enough we’re seeing some private equity firms with interest in providing some of the finance for doing this transformational kind of thing. So it’s becoming a much more interesting –  remembering the Chinese proverb “may you live in interesting times” – environment to work in and it probably is going to stretch a number of organizations like ours in the consultancy and advisory markets in helping our clients get over the issues that they may be having.

Tom Tunstall: I would agree with that. One thing I do want to comment on, with regard to when we would see things getting clearer, and settling out, I think a month may be too optimistic – particularly considering the fairly massive government interventions taking place right now. I think it’s more likely it’ll be a full quarter before we see clients deciding upon, or being able to strategise around, increased use of outsourcing. The analogy I’ve heard used recently is the deer in the headlights – a lot of companies, particularly financial service firms have been caught off-guard by the depth of the financial turmoil.

I think it’s likely that’s the first-order effect. The second-order effect, we’re starting to see apart from banking is a cascade into insurance as well as other types of organizations. Automotive manufacturers are under stress, and other industries are likely to be affected as well. Probably consumer non-discretionary items are going to be least impacted, and if they are it’ll take the longest to occur. Unfortunately, financial services are probably just the first-order effect. As all of you know this often creates opportunities for outsourcing suppliers.

SSON: So at least a quarter of uncertainty?

Tom Tunstall: I think so. If the markets had been allowed to correct, and to assign prices to the assets, then I think we might have had a sharper downturn but it would have occurred more quickly and we would have started to see some clarity. The government involvement creates more uncertainty and will stretch the timeline out for any sort of recovery.

Charles Aird: Until the credit crisis sorts itself out a lot of clients just aren’t able to get financing for operating capital, so we see clients just hanging onto their cash because of that kind of issue.

Phil Fersht: I think the election plays into this a little as well, in terms of who gets in; are there going to be any immediate strategies on bringing work back onshore? I think that’s another factor.

Katherine Kawamoto: I think what we’re seeing is that some decisions are starting to stall, particularly in areas related to outsourcing, and if companies are going to go forward with an outsourcing operation they’re proceeding very cautiously and are really waiting for the dust to settle. We’re hearing that budgets are starting to be looked at with more scrutiny and are starting to be reduced for the coming year, so some of the projects that people had anticipated rolling out in the first quarter are now on hold; that could be problematic for a number of the companies that we work with.

SSON: Looking a bit further ahead, what do you think will be the impact on the sourcing industry over the next few years? Do we think this is going to lead to a general reorganization of sourcing providers?

Phil Fersht: I think for some of the up-and-coming Indian providers I think this might have come a little bit sooner than they’d wished. Yes, it’s creating a ton of opportunity, but the bigger question is: when the world’s in crisis, and companies are looking to find relationships that can take them to the next level – or that can get them out of this mess – are they willing to take a risk on a provider that doesn’t have a lot of experience. So I think that this might have come a little sooner than some of the providers may have wanted, whereas it may create an opportunity for some of the incumbents to cement their positions so they can ride out the storm and consolidate further. I think we’ll see some really step up and be successful; I think others will drop away quite quickly.

We’ll also see a move towards the ability to augment application development work with BPO, for example. Providers who can really prove that they’ve got their act together bringing together systems architects, business process analysts and application development people to work across broader business goals are really going to be more successful in the long term; those providers that are pure-play process or pure-play IT need to think very seriously about how they’re going to develop their solutions in the coming years.

Tony Rawlinson: I think it’s going to be quite situational. On the one hand firms like TCS – who’ve recently done what I take to be a very attractive deal to buy Citi’s BPO banking operations in India – clearly have a strategy to acquire service lines and scale up, and I think they’ll be successful. There’re clearly signs at the moment that it’s a buyer’s market, and some of the activity we will see will be more selective sales of captive operations – or if not that, certainly selective outsourcing of captive back office processes. I think conversely what we’ll also see emerging will be providers that continue to specialize. Some of the big Indian KPO players will not want to scale up. They won’t want to be reliant on having to make large capital investments. They’ll stick to their knitting. I think service providers with a clear strategy will be those that are successful.

To pick up on the point a minute ago, I think I’d agree too that actually it’s not so much the new deal activity that’s pivotal for a lot of these providers: it’s going to be extending, restructuring, realigning their existing outsourcing relationships with clients, in order to grow revenue for them but also to address client needs. We see a continuation – certainly in financial services – of center-led strategies to outsourcing being successful but conversely there are still a lot of institutions out there that are behaving quite dysfunctionally, at business-unit level or geography level, and those sort of buyers are still a real headache for providers to deal with.

Brian Smith: One observation I would make is that we’ve seen a lot of people looking at moving away from India over the last few months, and starting to look at different locations, and I suspect that this will cause some reconsideration of that because there will be – at least in the sort term – some capability in India that may not have been there previously as things slow down a bit, and this may cause people to stop looking elsewhere. In that sense, for the Indian provider community, this may not be as bad a thing as maybe could be construed.

Charles Aird: I agree with that. I think that the Indian market is not as attractive as it was before, but then I don’t consider a TCS or an Infosys to be an Indian company any more; they’re just as global as IBM as Accenture, and they’ve diversified very successfully into Eastern Europe and China and South America and places like that. But one of the things we’ve seen, just before this hit – and I wonder what the impact is going to be – is that we’ve found clients more comfortable with setting up captives in remote areas, in Eastern Europe, in China, in India, wherever, because of some perceived dissatisfaction with service providers. Service providers are getting spread really thin in their delivery teams. We’re all going for similar skill-sets, whether it’s a major service provider, one of the advisory firms like us and our competitors, or a client with its performance management and governance – and so the thing with service providers is that clients think they’re not getting out of the deals what they expected to, and start to think about going more into the captive environment. So it’ll be interesting to see over the next few months if that continues as a trend – and some of our research has shown that a lot of people are going to more captive – or if they will leverage the financing that I mentioned earlier through service providers to go the outsourcing route.

Tony Rawlinson: From an EquaTerra research perspective we’ve certainly seen signs of a slowdown in the trend to captives. I think we’re beginning to see now – depending on the market and the proposition of the provider – certainly a growing maturity and range of some service provider offerings, and I think I’d expect to see the credit crunch at least make financial institutions and other organizations reassess whether they want to be in the captive game, and certainly in some circumstances – as the Citi example has shown – to focus on core businesses and leverage the growing capability of some of these providers to pick up commodity services, whilst at the same time assessing which of the processes that are in their captives right now give them competitive differentiation, and making sure they hold onto those.

Brian Smith: Tony raises some good points there; we just did some benchmarking of captives in India and observed that the smaller captives – even the medium-sized captives – are not as efficient as third parties; it’s only the bigger ones that can achieve that degree of efficiency, and it tends to be the bigger ones which get sold, as we’ve seen happening twice recently. My sense is that I do agree that people do want to have captives, but sometimes the economics don’t support that decision and sometimes it’s more a politically or risk-driven decision.

Phil Fersht: We definitely don’t see a move back towards captives at all at AMR; it’s been much more of a shift away from that strategy, particularly for captives smaller than 150, 200 staff that are very challenging to run, very costly, and where in many cases the cost per transaction or the cost of managing staff has spiralled out of control. The other issue is finding providers that actually want to invest and buy them. You look at the financial services space right now and the cost per transaction or trade is through the roof at the moment – because you can’t lay off staff very easily in India, it’s very complex to do that – and at the same time these companies want to be more flexible. They want to have a more flexible infrastructure that can allow for future divestitures, and the common thinking is that an outsourced model allows for more flexibility in the future. We’ll see a few selective strategic acquisitions like TCS-Citi, and we may see Lehman and a few of the other captives get snapped up, but I don’t think this is going to be a broad trend. I just don’t think there’s enough appetite to buy all these captive centers. We’re going to see a lot of them being slowly phased out and merged into outsourcing operations. That’s the way we see things right now.

SSON: Are you saying that – without wishing to be too melodramatic – we might witness the slow death of the captive?

Phil Fersht: I think unless you’re a big-brand, well-resourced organization where you want to invest in having high-quality processes running offshore – and a lot of the captives now are very high-quality, they do very good work, they’re just expensive – in a down-market or volatile market it goes against the model of being predictive and being nimble. I think we’ll always have specialist areas remaining within certain captive operations, but I think it’s going to be more in areas like engineering than in back-office, data-analytics, areas like that where we’re getting a proven model. Offshore companies are very good at doing this stuff: it doesn’t make sense to keep it all in-house.

Charles Aird: I would agree with that. When I say “captive” I go back to my definition of sourcing which includes manufacturing, engineering, R&D, and so on, and a lot of the time we see our clients going as captives into China, India, etc, in manufacturing and R&D because again they’re not able to find resources in the US, whereas they’re not as likely to do that in IT or accounting or the F&A processes that are not core to their operations.

Phil Fersht: We were talking with some clients the other day, and a lot of them have reduced budgets for next year in things like IT, and now have no choice but to look at outsourcing models that work for them; anything that is bread-and-butter like core HR, core financials, they’re looking at moving out now, and actually taking industry-specific areas that give them the value-add, that are client-facing, and consolidating that stuff in-house. That’s really where things are moving and I think we’ll see a heavy move towards non-core, non-mission-critical support operations being moved into the outsourced model; I think this economic crisis is just going to accelerate and expedite that process.

Tom Tunstall: I would agree with that. Captives represent something of an opportunity, either as an acquisition candidate, or as a way to put together a creative deal to help clients move to more of a variable cost model.

Tony Rawlinson: The only other thing I’d add – and it’s been a thread running through our conversation anyway – is that a lot of clients have very complex sourcing maps, multi-sourcing, multi-provider landscapes. Some of them have not traditionally been very good at managing these landscapes. So in an era when we’re all agreeing there’s going to be greater pace to selectively offshore and selectively outsource more, the skills that are going to be fundamental to success are going to be around governance and managing these multi-source landscapes. So there’s certainly going to be a need for us in the advisory community to play our part in equipping clients to successfully make that trip.

SSON: Let’s talk a little about locations. We were discussing India a minute ago, and the idea that it might benefit a little from the downturn in terms of people postponing their decisions to move out of the country. Is it too early to pinpoint the winners in terms of locations that might come best out of the crisis?

Katherine Kawamoto: I think it depends on what you’re sourcing. If you’re talking about services, then I’d say whatever country has the largest talent-pool and the lowest wage inflation. From a wage standpoint you could look at the US and claim we would be one of the better countries as far as sourcing goes.

Charles Aird: I think India has a lot of issues that may cause them even greater pain during the crisis. I’ve lived in India, set up centers there, and am very acquainted with the environment there; but over the last few years the retention issues they have, the escalation in wages, and the perceived drop in quality in both IT and BPO, have caused a lot of frustrations with clients. So I don’t see clients knocking on our doors to say “let’s go to India”. More and more they’re looking at alternatives: China, Eastern Europe, South America, those countries that started making inroads into what India has been doing. I think the current crisis may cause even more of that to occur.

Brian Smith: I do think however that this will maybe cause a reduction in the attrition rate in India, which will be a good thing and one that will make people feel more comfortable. We may also see some change in the underlying economics of offshoring particularly from some of the less expensive regions within the US, and making the business case for doing this may get more difficult.

Tony Rawlinson: I think it’s got to be looked at through the lens of what the requirement is, where the point of service delivery is, where the point of service receipt is, and against that backdrop EquaTerra feels that India will continue to be the dominant market for these services. I think they’re going to be helped clearly by the move we’ve already talked about from captive to outsourced; I think some of the weakness in the global economy is going to feed through to lower wage inflation in India which might address some of the frustration that was mentioned a minute ago. We see China maturing but frankly not rapidly enough to be a universal service delivery response, and clearly Eastern Europe has its supporters mainly around continental European customers who take a more conservative approach to risk.

This is very much an Anglophone discussion and we’re seeing the emergence of places like Morocco serving the French market, for instance, and we’ve talked already about Brazil serving the US market. I think overall our view would be that India will continue to be the big player but we’d also see a “horses for courses” approach being taken by clients and a recognition that risk needs to be managed on a global basis: it doesn’t make sense to have all your services running out of one country.

Phil Fersht: I can add a little additional perspective on that: let’s look at the types of services that are being outsourced to different locations. When you look at IT, I think India has developed a very strong position now delivering high-quality programming, application development services, at labor costs often a quarter of what you’d find in places like the US or UK. I think that’s just going to go from strength to strength as that model matures. They have a real industry developing, with strong training programs and very strong footprints. I think a broader area where it’s still an open game is BPO, and when you look at the fact that you can hire BPO staff for $25-30,000 a year in rural areas of the USA, the arbitrage trade-off with India and other countries isn’t that great – and if Obama takes power and gives even further tax breaks to incent countries to onshore, I do think that nations like the US – and even the UK – are still in the game. And I think that that’s going to be the area where we’re going to see some change globally.

Don’t rule out the Latin American countries for providing voice services and employee services and things like that. But I think on the IT side it’s almost a done deal now: I think India has cemented their footholds, they’re moving into the European markets, they’ll develop intelligent resources in the US and the UK and other places to service their clients. It’s more in the BPO area where we’re going to see more variety, and different countries offering different unique characteristics.

Katherine Kawamoto: It seems to me that wage inflation is such a key factor in these decisions; a couple of people have mentioned Brazil, but if you look at the inflation there that seems to be on the rise – or at least is trending in an upward direction. Globally these are really tough decisions to make because the economies themselves are so unpredictable at this point. We really can’t predict with any certainty what to predict in the way of wage increases. As to the point about Obama: I think it will have an impact; I don’t know how soon it will have an impact, however. I’m not as certain that these things will turn around as quickly as some of the panel have indicated. I really think this is a much longer-term issue that we’re faced with.

Tom Tunstall: I think there are some things that – no matter who’s in office – will preclude an easy repatriation of jobs, if you will. With the electronic mechanisms available, some of that stuff is going to be fairly difficult, and frankly a lot of the jobs that do get outsourced are on the lower end whereas jobs created through outsourcing often are managed in the US and tend to be higher up the value-chain. The idea that whoever happens to be in the White House will affect these things greatly is likely oversimplifying things a bit. Global macro effects override a lot of that.

Charles Aird: I think I’d agree with that. I’m pretty cynical about election campaigns – and we went through a lot of this same rhetoric in the last campaign; some of you may remember Lou Dobbs and all of those things. And then we didn’t see a great deal of change. Obama will more than likely win the election – I can’t imagine him not, given the way things are going these days – and I think the issues he will have to face when he becomes president are much larger than what’s happening in outsourcing around the world.

Tony Rawlinson: I think it’s maybe worth looking at this more holistically as well as from a service provider perspective. The Indian players are becoming global players, the MNCs have deepened their investment in India and other low-cost economies. I think the successful service providers are going to be able to load-balance their client requirements across multiple geographies – so actually it’s probably going to be smart in many cases for clients to let the service providers take those decisions and let the economics of the deals drive where the requirements are placed.

SSON: That sounds like another reason to be concerned about the future of the captive model.

Tony Rawlinson: I think so, overall – although we shouldn’t be too black and white. Yet another driver here that we need to look at – and I’m not sure I know the answer to this one – is there have been signs in recent months, until the credit crunch, of wage price arbitrage not being the only driver of offshoring. It was increasingly coming to be seen as an acquisition of capability. So I think potentially what we’re going to see at least in the short term is a reawakening of the wage price arbitrage driver and I do think to your last point that that’s going to be associated predominantly with outsourcing.

SSON: OK, let’s move on. How can people in the industry best mitigate against the worst effects of the crisis in the short-term – what are the easy wins which can at least lessen the impact of what we know is going to be a pretty lengthy downturn?

Charles Aird: Somebody mentioned this earlier: for a lot of clients maybe it’s time to take stock of the relationships they already have, and improve their governance and performance management. We see a lot of organizations that get through the honeymoon period – whether it’s captive or whether it’s a service provider relationship – and they’re not getting out of the deals what they expected to get. And quite often it is those two areas: the governance is poor, the training on both sides between the client and the service provider is really bad, and the performance management is just not up to speed. In the short term, trying to improve the performance of the deals that are currently in place would be an excellent way for a client to go forward.

Brian Smith: I would agree with that. I think that there are many smallish transactions that have been done – small numbers, moved either domestically or offshore – that have never truly been leveraged across organizations because they belong to one business unit or one particular function within an organization, and I think this may prompt people to realise that looking for that enterprise-level direction is something that is going to add value at this point in time, and to get more strategic in how they manage these relationships.

Tony Rawlinson: We see the value-leakage in outsourcing at the front end of the sourcing lifecycle: ie where a client’s got the wrong strategy or the strategy is too distributed across business units. So there needs to be some focus there to ensure that some of the short-termism that will inevitably be around doesn’t lose sight of the need to have a sustainable target operating model. I think the other area, as Brian covered there, is that value-leakage often is most rife around sourcing and management, so I see a continuation of the multisourcing approach. I think there’s an interest in clients to go to best-of-breed providers, but I think as more stuff is outsourced I think that that governance challenge has to be met head-on, and we need to help our clients invest in the right skills to manage these multi-provider landscapes successfully.

Tom Tunstall: One of the things from ACS’ perspective that we intend to do is continue to focus on client intimacy – which to Charlie’s point should help us better understand the landscape and client requirements. The other thing we intend to do is make greater use of business process utility, delivering the same standardized process to multiple clients, our own technology and best practices; those types of approaches in the short term should allow our clients to save money and we think certainly in the near term that’s going to be top of the list: minimizing investment and saving costs.

Katherine Kawamoto: One of the things that we recommend is that now is really the time to benchmark current processes, and redesign if necessary. Certainly if you’re not already outsourcing but it’s something you might want to look at, it’s better to have a good process that you throw over the fence, versus what we’ve seen in the past where people have just given whatever processes existed at the time to someone else to go and sort it out. We are recommending that people do some self-assessments, do some benchmarking, and proceed with a little more knowledge.

Phil Fersht: All really good points here. We spend a lot of time talking with a lot of business leaders about this and the key issue now is for providers and leading sourcing executives to sit down and work out how to create some innovation within an engagement. Innovation doesn’t just mean operationally effective; it means actually finding new ways of doing things, finding ways of bringing together things like application design with business process design more effectively, and building business-level metrics that can achieve that. So how can you incent vendors to deliver business performance, and not penalise vendors for missing their metrics one quarter, that sort of thing.

We’ve seen that penalising vendors doesn’t really work; there needs to be more collaboration, there need to be better ways of managing vendor relationships, and I think it’s up to the intermediaries, the third parties, the consultants, the analysts of this world, to really help drive this conversation to the next level, to really help create more innovative contracts. It doesn’t help when vendors sell deals that are literally just providing bodies to the client, and the client doesn’t really know how to manage them. There needs to be a greater focus from companies on how to do this more effectively.

Look at the Big Four consulting firms; they need to build practices that are specialized in governing outsourcing contracts. I think too many of those companies are too focused at this point on old-style business models, on shared services and things like that. The vendors need to step up, the buyers need to step up, everybody needs to step up and start being more innovative and thoughtful about how this industry is changing and how we can design a curriculum to reflect that.

Charles Aird: One of my concerns is that our clients use consultants too much! And everybody may be appalled at that but: we find that they’re too dependent on us for helping them set up the governance or the deal or the shared service environment or whatever, and then when we go away they’re not able to maintain it, so more and more we’re encouraging them to embed a center of excellence, or a sourcing team – call it whatever you want – into their organizations so that they can take tools and templates that come from us, or others, and then extend them through their organizations over a period of time to be able to do the deals themselves. So that’s a hope. It may even be a dream. Some organizations obviously have been able to carry it off very well in the world, but I think most of them are still struggling around that and, as I say, I think most organizations use consultants too much, and depend upon them too much.

Tony Rawlinson: I’d generally go with that, and I think it’s got to the point now where it’s incumbent on all of us to incorporate skills trends in our advice. I think there’s enough outsourcing that’s going to go on for us not to be too frightened of clients growing their capabilities, and I’ve always been very evangelical about outsourcing only working if it’s properly managed by both provider and client. I think it’s in everyone’s interests at the end of the day.

Brian Smith: A client who’s not doing this and does not embrace the need for them to manage is not going to succeed, and I think we need to help them understand how to embrace that. We need collectively to evolve our way of helping them through that post-deal phase of life and we can do that in many creative ways.


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Jamie Liddell

Backfiring of Political Predictions – What Can we Decipher Out of These?

May 18th, 2012

There’s a lot of difference between expecting something to happen, hoping for something to happen, assuming that something will happen, and predicting something to happen; logically or otherwise. While predicting on the basis of logical assumptions is all right, I simply don’t understand how some folks risk their reputation by not only predicting something publicly, but saying it with so much confidence, you’d think they replying “yes” to being question “are you alive”. Here are some “outrageous predictions” which backfired on those who made them (you may or may not have read about them; nevertheless, worth reading):

Somewhere in mid 2007, Dennis Blair and Kenneth Lieberthal had predicted that “The risks to maritime flows of oil are far smaller than assumed”. They gave several reasons to back their words. These were: It would require a naval power having the strength that matched the US, to seriously disrupt oil shipments. Secondly, limited regional conflicts wouldn’t much affect traffic, simply ruling out any economic effects if terrorists attacked the shipping industry. They even said that tankers are not so vulnerable. What happened? November’08 saw a group of Somali pirates hijacking a Saudi oil tanker carrying 2 million barrels of crude oil in the Indian Ocean. Surprisingly, they came only in “inflatable rafts”! As per the Piracy Reporting Center, ship hijacking by pirates has actually quadrupled this year! Ironically, the essay was called “Smooth Sailing: The world’s shipping lanes are safe”.

In the beginning of 2008, BusinessWeek had predicted that New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg will enter the presidential race on the basis of his financial power and organization; which was expected to impress voters and stun competitors. They also predicted that Michael would not win but lose by a marginal number to John McCain, Arizona’s maverick senator. None of this came true! John never contested the election and as far as presidency is concerned, we all know that the winner is Barrack Obama.

Jim Cramer, one of the popular CNBC host informed publicly in March’08 that Bear Sterns is not in trouble and no one in their right minds should disinvest from it. What happened? Within six days, the stocks price went down by ninety percent and was finally sold to JPMorgan Chase for pennies.

In mid 2008, Arjun Murti, the oil analyst at Goldman Sachs predicted oil to touch $200 a barrel within 6 to 24 months. As of writing this, it seems to touch a record low of $40.

The British newsweekly ran an editorial praising the quality of Kenya’s democracy and predicted that it might set an example for the rest of the continent. This came just a week before the presidential elections. Not by a long shot! What followed was a horrible month of riot and bloodshed. Voter fraud and ballot stuffing were some great “unpredictions”, if such a word exists in the dictionary. Over 800 people (official figures only) were killed and a phenomenal 200,000 were injured and /or harmed in the carnage. The country was deeply divided and the government was delegitimized, with power shared between the President Mwai Kibaki and Raila Odinga, his challenger.

Finally, if you remember the case of the Large Hydron Collider, the scientist Walter Wagner predicted that there was a great possibility of creating destructive theoretical anomalies like black holes, strangelets and deSitter space transitions. This would alter matter and destroy the planet. He had filed a lawsuit against the European Organization for Nuclear Research which built the collider. What happened? The machine was turned on in Sept’08 and we are all still alive and kicking!

Nirjara Rustom
http://www.articlesbase.com/politics-articles/backfiring-of-political-predictions-what-can-we-decipher-out-of-these-706410.html