Greentree Connects Comvergent Group Telecoms Company
Comvergent Group looks to Greentree for a scalable, Cloud-based business system enabling complex data management.
“We’re a growing business in the very competitive telecommunications network space. Quick access to data, coupled with prompt and accurate billing, is very important in achieving the best customer engagement. Greentree is the key to maintaining that edge over our competitors.”
Paul Garston is the Managing Director of a recently merged company that handles large network rollouts for the telecommunications industry in Britain and western Europe. Comvergent Group specialises in project planning and logistics for blue chip technology providers such as Ericsson, Nokia, Huawei, NEC and British Telecom. It acquired T James Telecoms to deliver on-site installation, commissioning and maintenance services, extending its capacity to offer end-to-end telecoms solutions.
The newly-merged company, needed to unify and update its business systems, operations and processes. After assessing more than half a dozen systems, including SAP Business 1 and Microsoft Dynamics NAV, the new company chose Greentree, hosted in the Cloud, and Partner, Prerogative.
Bringing two businesses together
Both Comvergent and T James work on large, critical projects such as the rollout of the 4G mobile network for Vodafone UK. The joint company now employs some 400 people, both internal staff and consultants, most of them highly skilled telecoms engineers. It works out of two business hubs in the North and the Midlands of the UK, but a large percentage of its workforce is out in the field, working on remote sites.
In recent years Comvergent has embarked on an acquisition strategy, which it anticipates will bring 15-20% annual growth. “Comvergent was working largely on spreadsheets, while T James had a very limited ERP system that was not expandable,” Paul explains. “The two systems couldn’t be integrated. “Because of those disparate systems there was no consistency of data and it’s wasteful to employ people just for data entry. Typically it took weeks to get that data into a manageable format.”
Driving in the dark
Delays in compiling reports meant Comvergent was always making decisions after the event. “It’s a bit like driving a car with the headlights off,” Paul says; “you know there’s a problem when you hit it. Greentree switches on the headlights, allowing us to put data into the system and see immediately what’s ahead of us.”
The joint company also had complex field maintenance needs that demanded integration to a very high standard: sales, job costing and CRM had to work seamlessly together to deliver the operational intelligence it really needed.
“It was vital to standardise all those processes,” says Paul. “There was too much knowledge in people’s heads, on spreadsheets or in individual computers; all of that had to be brought into a single framework.”
Best value and fit
“Greentree’s real edge was its flexibility in terms of its modular nature and its ability to scale to meet our future requirements,” Paul says. “The other systems seemed to be more ‘you get what you’re given’.
“The look and feel of Greentree was very good, and the ability to do things like create dashboards for individual users was very attractive. In the end, Greentree gave the best value and fit.”
Prerogative also demonstrated Greentree’s reliability as a Cloud-hosted solution. “Going forward the speed of access via the Cloud is always going to be better,” Paul says. “Cost wasn’t the primary driver; having an upgradable and dynamic Cloud support solution is much more attractive than having on-premise hardware. “We look to Greentree to provide cost savings, shorten our time between order and billing to improve our cash position, and position us for scalable business growth.”
Comvergent Group is a UK-based service provider within the communications sector capable of delivering an innovative range of installation, commissioning and maintenance services both in the UK and overseas.
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