South African demand is expected to be strong for the new modular information technology service management (ITSM) solution from FrontRange Solutions, an international leader in service management and customer relationship management (CRM) software solutions for small to medium enterprise (SME) and distributed enterprise organisations.
So says Tracey Newman, managing director for FrontRange Solutions Africa. "South African organisations are increasingly realising that consolidated IT service management is a significant means of differentiating themselves from their competitors.
"We see the trend in the fact that from having only one small company offering IT service management consulting, the country now has several large and small companies in that space. Most of the change has been triggered by growing awareness among chief information officers of the benefits of the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) best practices.
"ITIL describes a proven practical framework for the planning and delivery of operational IT services based on actual experience rather than a purely theoretical approach. It also provides a non-proprietary and impartial guidance that is applicable to all organisations irrespective of sector and which is independent of the hardware and software being used.
"So we`ve incorporated ITIL into FrontRange`s ITSM solution to maximise an organisation`s ability to cut costs, increase efficiencies and manage change.
"But its true value lies in enabling organisations to convert their IT systems and management from a technical cost centre into a service centre - by ensuring that IT services are aligned with and satisfy business needs, creating a common language between technical areas and customers, and giving technical areas and staff a commercial orientation."
FrontRange ITSM also improves system reliability and availability, provides a basis to agree levels of service and the ability to measure IT service quality. And it enables an organisation to cater easily for a constantly changing business and technical environment.
However, Newman warns that many IT service management solutions are assembled from an array of different applications, making them cumbersome and costly to work with.
"The whole idea of IT service management is to simplify, consolidate, integrate and automate in order to eliminate redundancy and potential for error. System administrators and chief information officers can often be dealing with 50 or 60 of their own different applications in a day, mostly putting out ad hoc fires. They don`t need an IT service management solution to add more applications. They need one tool to help them identify and rectify the weaknesses in their IT systems. That means getting coherent and relevant information that gives you a real-time overview on which to base critical strategic decisions about staffing, procurement, maintenance, management and capacity."
FrontRange`s ITSM solution is rare in its ability to provide that overview, with each of its seven modules launched from a single common architecture. This allows all applications to work from a single database and easily exchange information - simplifying reporting across all levels of the business.
The solution combines robust out-of-the-box functionality with easy customisation, which enables companies to rapidly and inexpensively implement solutions tailored to their needs and eliminates resource-intensive development and maintenance. A single source of support data as well as a customisable dashboard is available for each job role in the support team. The single dashboard enables members to pull data critical to their job role from many areas of the organisation onto a single screen.
Developed using input from its customers, FrontRange`s ITSM solution`s modules include incident, problem, change, release, availability, configuration and service level management.
Each ITSM module integrates with FrontRange`s category-leading help-desk solution, HEAT - allowing organisations already using it to move into comprehensive service management without the cost and complexity of migrating to a new system.
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FrontRange Solutions is the leading independent provider of service management and CRM applications designed specifically for the SME and distributed enterprise markets. Our applications and solutions allow organisations to manage extraordinary customer relationships and provide exceptional service. The company is headquartered in Pleasanton, California in the US, with offices in Colorado, UK, Germany, Italy, SA, Australia, China and Singapore.
FrontRange product families include GoldMine, for customer relationship management, team-based contact management and sales forces automation solutions; and HEAT, for complete service management including help-desk, knowledge management, asset management and service level management.
FrontRange Solutions drives business decisions for market-leading companies such as Affinity Logic, Barloworld, British American Tobacco (SA), Nissan, Coris Capital, Daimler-Chrysler, Datacentrix, De Beers, Financial Services Board, Johannesburg Water, Standard Bank and Volkswagen SA.
FrontRange has earned more than 60 major industry awards, including: Software Magazine "Hot 500," Windows Magazine "Win 100," Call Centre CRM Solutions Magazine Editor`s Choice, RealWare Award for CRM, WinMag.com WinList Award, Entrepreneur Magazine Best Software, Call Centre Solutions Product of the Year, and InformationWeek Top 50 Application Service Providers.
For more information, please visit our We bsite at www.frontrange.co.za or contact us on +27 11 325 5600.
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