Company Slashes Development Time by 60%
Turns Quick Profit
The Company
The firm is an operating unit of the only large specialized provider of proprietary investment support systems, the pioneer and a leading
provider of comprehensive computer disaster recovery services, and a provider of proprietary healthcare information systems. The firm, located in Atlanta,
Georgia, provides customers outsourcing for application maintenance, complex system development and life-cycle maintenance, application reengineering, turnkey
systems operation, and migration of applications to new platforms. The firm produces and sells a stock/bond management system called FASTOCK PC®. It is a
shareholder information and accounting system available for the personal computer, providing stock management capability for small- to medium-sized shareholder
base processing firms. The original design for the FASTOCK product (then known as CSS) was written in COBOL and deployed in the IBM mainframe CICS®
environment. Later, it was ported to the PC environment, redeveloped for IBM OS/2®, and renamed FASTOCK PC.
"With (ESI’s solution) the project (was) ready at least three times sooner than if we had not used (their solution). It would have
cost us around two man years plus training.”
The Challenge
Due to pressure to control development costs, increase market share, and satisfy customer demand for Windows-based applications, the firm
decided to redesign FASTOCK PC in order to remain competitive. The firm wanted to build on their existing applications without losing their COBOL heritage. The
firm’s objectives were to enhance development productivity, to be positioned to respond quickly to future needs, and fulfill customer demands. The
solution also had to allows the firm’s programmers the flexibility to deliver the new system without affecting their current support
responsibilities.
The Solution
The firm decided on ESI’s total solution including technology and services. ESI's COBOL-based
technology for developing GUI Windows applications offered more than a GUI painter, it provided an extensive code generator. It allowed the firm to build GUI
programs quickly and easily. It also leveraged the firm’s extensive COBOL experience and existing application code into the Windows environments without
the expense and time of extensive staff retraining. In addition, ESI’s solution insulated the company from the tedium of GUI programming in Windows and
its COBOL-based approach was ideal for the mainframe programmers. While the project proceeded at a rapid pace, getting the Windows application to customers
even faster would substantially increase customer satisfaction and marketability. For this reason, the firm used ESI’s Services for additional project
resourcing. ESI Services provides the firm with custom consulting and on-site support for all phases of the project including: planning, implementation,
technical support, and product training.
The
Result
The firm utilized ESI’s total technology and services solution
to meet the steep time frames associated with the project. With the project on schedule, the firm took FASTOCK® 2000 to market, providing customers and
prospects with a state-of-the-art solution, well in advance of their original projections.
"ESI Services has really helped in this bind. We had to produce Windows applications
quickly and ESI Services made it possible. We can meet market demand and generate revenue sooner."
"With (ESI's solution) the project was ready at least three times sooner than if we had not used (the solution). It would have
cost us around two man-years plus training"
-- Vice President of Technology Services, Sungard