Engineers in Japan lend expertise to Médecins Sans Frontières

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), an international humanitarian aid organization providing emergency medical assistance in more than 70 countries, is one of the most respected non-profit organizations in Japan. HP has supported MSF Japan since 2001 with equipment donations and HP’s ProLiant server and many PCs are now in use at the MSF office in Tokyo.

Last October, Eric Ouannes, General Director of MSF Japan, visited HP’s Japan Headquarters where he expressed thanks for HP’s support and asked for further technical consulting for MSF’s IT system. Mr. Ouannes explained that because MSF activities were based on donation, most of their funds had to be used for emergency medical assistance, leaving little for their operating budget. He emphasized however that the IT system was critical for their activities and also fund raising, so HP’s help would be highly appreciated.

In response, HP Japan started to recruit employee volunteers and Hiromu Goto, ESS Presales BCS manager, accepted the role of volunteer leader. After visiting MSF he defined two main issues:

• Renewal of their web-based fundraising system: needing support to decide system configuration
• Security of their internal IT system: needing security assessment and build security policy  

In January, 2010 employees with appropriate expertise were invited to volunteer through the “@hp Japan” intranet and after a kick off meeting in February, 15 engineers decided to take part.

Six volunteers, known as the “Fundraising system team”, supported the MSF in redesigning their web site, visiting the MSF office almost bi-weekly after work, from February to the end of April. A second team consisting of nine security specialists, is currently working with the MSF IT team and providing skills and knowledge of security assessment and building security policy. Their project will finish in September.  

Eric Ouannes, met with Shinichi Koide, MD for Japan, in June and emphasized how much these voluntary projects would help MSF activities. Shinichi Koide, said that contributing employee expertise and not just equipment, was a “win-win” relationship for HP and MSF, with great feedback from volunteers and a positive impact on their motivation.