Wholly owned Billcad subsidiary, the South African Business EXchange (SABEX), has invested more than R12 million in equipment to provide vertical application services in specific industries targeted by the group.
Supplied by Unihold Technologies, the deal consists primarily of two quad-processor, Alpha-based Compaq servers and some 400 terabytes of RAID (Redundant Array of Independent/Inexpensive Disks) storage capacity. According to Mark Morris, marketing manager of Billcad Holdings, the two servers are intended to back each other up in a fault tolerant configuration.
Morris, offers the superior scalability of the DEC systems and high levels of support available from Unihold as primary reasons for the purchasing decision. "SABEX views the continued availability of these systems as critical," he says.
Shedding some light on the subject, Eon de Koker, director of SABEX, says the company provides access to business applications written to support the travel, medical, legal and insurance industries. "These services are accessible using a simple PC connected to the Internet - obviating the need for individuals and organisations we deal with to invest heavily in technology," he comments.
Citing its travel industry offering as an example, De Koker says it empowers individuals to set up and run a small full service travel agency from home - providing access to a large variety of booking systems, from airlines to hotels and car hire firms.
"By contrast, the legal offering is focused more on research. It enables a local attorney to search for precedents, look up specific cases or even access the court roll - again, via the Internet," he adds.
Morris describes these services - and the others offered by SABEX - as `true e-commerce`. "We`ve taken the concept [of e-commerce] beyond simple electronic mail-order and are offering real value across the Internet for similar industries," he says.
Peter Karam, sales executive at Unihold Technologies, describes the SABEX model as outsourcing. "Its quite simple," he says, "SABEX offers certain industry specific services across the Internet - a medium which by its very nature requires a 24hr X 7 day operational system and one that is easily able to scale to meet increased demand."
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