A More Flexible Enterprise
May 13, 2009
These days, the name of the game in construction is lowering the risk. Technology can play a strong role in that process, and one software provider has made this its primary theme with the announcement of its latest program and project management platform.
e-Builder, www.e-builder.net, Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., has announced the release of Enterprise 7, the latest version of its capital program and project management software.
One of the unique features of this release is the Offline Office Integration Toolset. This allows users to continue to do their work in familiar applications like Microsoft Word, Excel, Outlook, as well as fax machines.
"Now, users can still use things like Microsoft Word or Excel to, for example, fill in an RFI or a daily report, and that information gets emailed straight to e-Builder. Our product then extracts the data from the document and puts it directly into the database where it is routed for approval," says Jonathan Antevy, co-founder and CEO, e-Builder. "The net effect is that project stakeholders don’t have to learn a new system."
Such features that allow users to continue working in familiar environments, yet still leverage the online project management capabilities, is a reason Antevy says the overall rate of adoption for e-Builder is on an upswing. "These types of things simply help to decrease people’s resistance to use the technology. There are a lot of great systems out there that simply don't get used because of people's resistance to change the way they are working. We are helping change that for companies."
Staying true to its work with the agcXML initiative, e-Builder has designed Enterprise 7 to include import/export tools, a Web services API, and an XML translation layer enabling, meaning integration with third-party applications require little to no custom programming.
As one of the more unique features to the release, e-Builder has added the ability to grow from flexible into structured workflow--which aims directly at helping owners lower risk and greatly decrease the implementation time.
Antevy outlines an example, "Some people may not have every business process well defined - take a change order request, for example, where every single step is not known. Rather than locking down a process that is not completely defined, we allow the client to start flexibly, which means they can make their own decisions and push that change order request in any direction they choose. Once they use the flexible system for a while, the process leaves an audit trail which we analyze and use to create the structured process. This eliminates most if not all of the rework that results when you implement a lot of structure from the get go."
Keeping inline with the traditional form of how e-Builder delivers solutions, Enterprise 7 is developed as a fully integrated platform using modern technology and components, and the company builds, implements, supports, operates, and maintains the system itself. e-Builder Enterprise 7 is designed so that it can be deployed in phases or one module at a time.