Oracle gets nod from HiTech Telecom

Stan Beer
Thursday, 19 January 2006 08:36

IT Industry - Deals

Australian VoIP wholesaler, HiTech Telecom, has opted to deploy Oracle E-Business Suite Special Edition and Oracle Database 10g on Red Hat Linux running on Dell Blade Servers, after a three way battle between enterprise giants Oracle, SAP and Microsoft .

The solution is designed to streamline a complex billing procedure aimed at delivering a 75 per cent improvement in cash flow. 

The benefits the company expects to achieve through the implementation of an Oracle standardised solution are:

- A standards-based, future-proof architecture which may be easily adapted and is designed to support a projected 400% growth in the company's size.
 
- A single data centre, based in Sydney, which can be accessed in offices around the world, in different languages using a portal interface.
 
- Significant ROI and a price advantage over both SAP's and Microsoft's equivalent SME market offerings.

HiTech, a small company with 55 staff around the world, claims to be experiencing enormous growth re-selling VoIP services to more than 200 telecommunication carriers and corporate customers around the world.  HiTech's highly complicated invoicing and rapid growth trajectory has led to the company changing its billing system four times in last 4½ years.  Earlier this year the company decided it needed to standardise on a technology that would solve the immediate problem and support swift growth moving forward.

'To keep up with our 20 to 30 per cent annual growth, we needed better financials and billing integration,' said Amadu Yahaya, COO, HiTech Telecom.  'We looked at Microsoft but felt the technology was too rigid.  We also spoke to SAP, but we weren't impressed by the support it was offering. Both also seemed too expensive.  Oracle is not only the best solution to suit our needs technologically, but it is also the most affordable and could be implemented within a fortnight.'

Previously, HiTech was working with a billing system that was difficult to integrate with its financial package. The software did not analyse the data so it had to be extracted and analysed in a separate piece of software.  Furthermore, the telco billing systems that HiTech had used over the past four years had been geared towards a switched environment so was not able to adapt to an IP framework. The system was very slow and the company's information was fragmented.

According to HiTech, once the Oracle solution had been implemented the company's data was integrated and clearly visible.  HiTech says the system is now able to report immediately on both the billing and the financial situation, meaning that decisions can be made instantly with a complete picture of the business.  It is this capability, HiTech claims, which has led to a 75% improvement in cash flow almost overnight.

'The Oracle solution is particularly suited to our international spread,' said Yahaya.  'We can save a great deal of time and money by basing all the technology in a data centre in Sydney and making the information available to all our staff in multiple offices in different countries - in English, French and Chinese - through the Oracle Portal.'

While the Oracle Mid-market team configured the solution, Oracle's Certified Partner, Igatech implemented it in two weeks using Rapid implementation methodology.  The modules HiTech purchased included Oracle General Ledger, Oracle Accounts Receivable, Oracle Accounts Payable, Oracle CRM and Sales.  Igatech will also be involved in deploying the Oracle Human Capital Management module later in the year.