Leading SA IT group, Spescom, has notched up another international success with its US subsidiary, Altris Software Inc., signing a contract with Continental Airlines for the supply of Altris' eB asset information management solution for the company's OnePass frequent flyer program. Continental was recently named Air Transport World's "Airline of the Year" and ranked No. 1 airline for customer satisfaction for both short and long-distance flights.
According to Spescom's chief communications officer, Barbara Kruger, the awarding of this latest international high profile contract is testament to the group's ongoing success in its aggressive world market drive.
"We have deployed a strategy targeting the global transportation arena, plus other market sectors. This latest deal, coupled with previous successes like the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Railtrack in the UK, attest to the growing international acceptance of the group's proprietary products and acknowledgement of Spescom as a significant world player in technology development", says Kruger.
Continental's latest endorsement of Altris' eB technology, follows the successful migration of the airline's aircraft maintenance records management application from an Altris' legacy product to eB in recent months.
The new OnePass application includes the implementation of eB and eB Workflow as a standard system and will manage all the correspondence generated and received within the OnePass Service Centre. Over the succeeding year the system will be developed further by Continental's Technology Division, utilising eB SDK (Software Developers Kit) and Staffware Enterprise Objects to provide an application that incorporates many of the organisation's existing systems. The new system will be known as OPAL (OnePass Application Layer).
According to Joel Hochstetler, Continental's director of application development, the company is highly impressed by eB's capabilities as a robust and easily scalable system to manage the wide array of documents, both generated and received, within the OnePass program.
"The efficiencies offered by the eB solution will enable us to continue to provide an excellent service to our client base and thereby retain their loyalty. We also believe it will be instrumental in gaining the confidence and support of future patrons. eB will also enhance our ability to respond to customer needs speedily and thereby more efficiently, " says Hochstetler.
"eB is providing us with significant benefits" says Rodger Ernst, project manager, Continental Airlines.
"Using the eB SDK along with Staffware Enterprise Objects, we have developed an application enabling the immediate delivery of aircraft maintenance documents to the appropriate user's workstation, thus automating multiple internal processes relating to those documents.
"Processing time has improved, resulting in a more effective and accurate product. We have overall improved quality enabling documents to go to the correct person the first time. Required documents are now speedily input, processed and retained. Furthermore, there is an increase in knowledge sharing as knowledge contained within maintenance documents can now be readily shared with the appropriate work groups for evaluation and follow up. This all adds up to us being able to provide the highest level of support in delivering the kind of service that our customers have come to expect," notes Ernst.
Roger Erickson, CEO of Altris Software Inc, comments: "It is significant that Continental selected eB from a number of potential solutions for its OnePass application. The high degree of data integrity assured by eB and the secure environment it offers will enable Continental to gain competitive advantage and retain its leading position for customer service within the airline industry. It is particularly gratifying that this continued support for our product follows the migration to eB for managing aircraft maintenance records, an application that is vital for the smooth running and operations of an airline of Continental's size and stature. Continental Airlines exemplifies our focus on the Transportation industry with the flexibility to extend our system within the organisation to other departments."
Continental has used an Altris system for some years in the management of aircraft maintenance documents. Federal Airworthiness Regulations (FAR's) require carriers to maintain all records of maintenance on aircraft, assemblies and appliances. In many cases these records must be retained for the operational life of the asset and in such a manner as to allow reliable access within a reasonable time period. For Continental these records are currently running at over 12 million pages with a growth rate in excess of 130,000 pages per month for maintenance records alone. Continental was the first major airline to deploy an FAA approved electronic system for the retention of required maintenance records. The eB system is also managing Human Resource records bringing the total number of pages under eB management to almost 20 million comprised of maintenance and personnel files.
Share
Spescom Limited is a communications and information technology company with operations in USA, UK and South Africa.
The group is active in two main areas of the world IT market, namely offering product and solutions to connect to the networked economy, and the provision of software solutions to manage information and knowledge.
The strategic focus is on the convergence of knowledge, document, configuration and voice transaction management technologies.
Spescom holds the controlling interest in USA based, Altris Software Inc., a NASDAQ, OTCBB listed company, and the developers of the award winning eB software.
In South Africa, Spescom, in alliance with world leading companies such as Cisco and Avaya, formerly known as Lucent Technologies, provides a range of customer contact and intelligent network solutions to its blue-chip customer base.
The company is a leading supplier of communications solutions and products to network operators and service providers on the African continent.
Spescom, through a joint venture with Siemens, is a world leading supplier of revenue management solutions with installations in 42 countries, focusing on the prepayment of electricity services.
Editorial contacts