Cringley sez:
«And those sources were clear: there is no way Wal-Mart would entrust its IT services to an outside contractor or even to several outside contractors. Doing so would threaten the entire organization. If costs are out of control and services are inconsistent, that's something to be dealt with internally, not by hoping some outside organization is smarter or more disciplined. "We have suppliers, sure, but the ultimate responsibility always remains here in Bentonville," said my Ozark IT guy. "We centralize it, we control it, we know what we are buying and what we are doing with it. Anything less is just too much of a risk."»
what walmart would do
What WalMart would do is what companies are doing (and have done) in lots of
other industries -- keep the production within the corporation, but move it
physically to a location where they can produce more cheaply. Hence AMD in
Dresden, monitor factories in the Czech Republic, Toyota factories in
Appalachia, etc..
