BAE Systems Integrated System Technologies (Insyte) is wholly-owned subsidiary of BAE Systems. The company is a major force in the European defence and electronics industry with a turnover of over € 1.2 Billion and an established international customer base in over 100 countries.

LEO is for Life

The Radar Systems and Customer Support divisions of Insyte have used LEO for 10 years for Product Data Management (PDM). LEO now plays a key role in the data management of the multi-million pound defence contracts operated by Insyte. LEO has managed the original mechanical design data since its introduction and is now managing the modification data for upgrades as well as all on-going in-service modifications.

Insyte has also increased the scope of its LEO system to manage the build state of its installed base. One contract alone comprises over 25,000 managed units in the field. LEO gives Insyte a joined-up single application from which it can manage the design changes and the build state of every installed unit and this is key to professional data management on the contract.

Successful Upgrade

Hamilton Hall has recently upgraded LEO at Insyte to Oracle 8i and Oracle Forms 6, an exercise which required transferring to a new Sun Enterprise V880 server and upgrading all the PC clients. This exercise was completed successfully and on target with no user downtime across three major sites. This now provides a gateway to web enablement and remote access, which will again be key to the installation of upgrades in the field.

Proven and Adaptable Data Model

In total, Insyte has over 300,000 parts, over 800,000 electronic drawing files with 1.5 million part structure relationships in the LEO system. It provides document management, change management, version control and bill of materials management processes and has an electronic interface into the Insyte manufacturing MRP system. It is the prime vehicle for viewing drawings, with over 8,000 viewed per week across the four business sites that use LEO.

LEO software utilises a proven data model combined with leading edge technology, providing a stable and secure product that is continually at the forefront of technical innovation. LEO at Insyte is yet another example that "LEO is for Life" - a product that once implemented, will never have to be replaced and that provides unrivalled functionality and benefits for minimal cost of ownership.

In July 2002, Fire Security viewed the SME website to identify potential suppliers of Service Management Systems. They made enquiries to six companies and quickly shortlisted three systems that met both the planned and reactive sales and service management requirements for the fire and security industry.

After extensive demonstrations and workshops simulating Fire Security's contract management, service logistics, job scheduling and mobile data requirements, the company placed an order for the LEO Service Management System from Hamilton Hall. The system operates over the three Fire Security branches via secure VPN access. Customers and staff have access via the web and mobile communication devices.

Fire Security is an innovative market leader, meeting customer needs in fire detection and the provision of security systems. The company has two divisions:

• The Fire Division acts as agent and distributor for the Gent fire detection equipment range. Gent is acknowledged as a market leader in its field, synonymous with product innovation and quality. Other product ranges include: aspirating detection, fire extinguishing, gas detection, Deafalerter, voice evacuation, call systems and emergency lighting. The Gent range of products is capable of meeting the fire installation needs of any building.
• The Security Division supplies intruder alarms, access control devices, intercoms, gates and barriers and provides quality CCTV design and technology.

Robin Hamill, Managing Director, commented: "We chose LEO because it provided an extensive and future proof solution for our growing business needs. The visual despatch board design and functionality enables any operator to tell at a glance the status of a call".

"This facility is fundamental for scheduling calls to the right person, in the right location and, most importantly, on time. We now have one system to manage stock, scheduling, calls, contracts and sales leads - in fact, all aspects of our business".

"This will be a key benefit and ensure information is entered once and not duplicated over several systems. The team at Hamilton Hall provided expertise, vision and support when we approached them. This made them stand out from the competition and is why we made them our number one choice".

Initial Rollout

In 1996 Norsk Data decided to replace their legacy in house call logging system with a modern enterprise level service management solution. Norsk Data, a major IT services supplier to many large UK corporate and government bodies, needed to find a package that would be robust enough to scale with the ever increasing demands of new business. After a detailed formal search of the market to find the best fit in both functionality and technical architecture, the LEO Service Management solution was chosen from Hamilton Hall.

The project, code named "Leopard", set out to replicate the current business functionality - including interfaces, but at the same time to identify and streamline less efficient processes. The initial phase consisted of comparing the data model and screens of the old system to LEO's, designing a project acceptance lifecycle to handle exceptions and finally to change the screens. In parallel, the following interfaces also had to be written:

• Cognito: For full mobile access to and from engineers.
• Customers' Systems: Via an Electronic Data Interface (EDI), enabling call logging and updates as well as accurate maintenance of inventory data.
• Mercury Pager: For automated call notification to engineers.
• Amtrak: Providing an overnight update of proof of delivery information.

At the time, Norsk Data managed contracts and engineers from a number of regional service centres. So, it was decided to roll out LEO region by region starting with the smallest first: Norfolk and Norwich - which accounted for 5% of calls. LEO's flexible Oracle architecture allowed the database server to remain in Newbury with regional access achieved via various WAN routes.

Dramatic Growth

In 2000 Norsk Data sustained substantial growth by winning several significant new contracts. The additional resources required to schedule the increased number of service calls was considered unsustainable. The solution decided upon was to implement the automated scheduling tool "Click Schedule" (previously known as "W6") from ClickSoftware. This allowed Norsk Data to automate the scheduling of service calls.

Hamilton Hall were tasked with integrating W6 into LEO. LEO is the master database providing W6 with all reference data needed to make a scheduling decision. Engineer Assignments are passed to LEO which, in turn, notifies engineers of jobs via Cognito units. According to Norsk Data Field Service Director, Ian Blake, the integrated LEO and W6 system has "... increased field force productivity by 25%, while reducing despatching labour by 80%".

Norsk Data now has one of the most sophisticated service management solutions in Europe. 40% of calls are automatically logged via EDI from customer systems. 70% of calls are scheduled automatically and engineers notified via mobile communications. LEO now handles 150,000 calls and call based transactions per month.

The Future

Through LEO and in house developed customer portals, Norsk Data is already providing customers with Internet access to log calls and view call progress, and with further development they are well placed to create one of Europe's first truly integrated virtual call centres.

Global Search

In 1995, Telus Systems Support, based in Vancouver, British Columbia, embarked on a global search to find an integrated service management system to manage their service contracts and first line support for telecommunications products and corporate data networks. They particularly wanted a system that included seamless sales and marketing, contract management, call logging, engineer logistics support and workshop management with the flexibility to cope with simple contracts for one man businesses with one computer up to large corporate customers with many sites. The ability to interface with legacy systems was also very important. After a detailed formal search of the market to find the best fit in both functionality and technical architecture, LEO Service Management was chosen from Hamilton Hall.

Phased Rollout

After a short proof of concept period the project based in British Columbia was rolled out in several phases:

• 1996 - LEO contract management with billing interface to legacy systems.
• 1996 - LEO call logging integrated with the national trouble management system and billing interface.
• 1997 - LEO engineer logistics and workshops.
• 1998 - BCTel merger with Telus. LEO rolled out to Alberta and Ontario.
• 1999 - LEO-SAP interface to new corporate billing.
• 2000 - LEO upgrade to latest Oracle 8 database server and Oracle Forms 6.
• 2002 - Hamilton Hall Internet portal support.

The cost of buying and implementing LEO provided a return on investment in just three months thanks to the increases in revenue generated. The project director, Doug Erickson, was able to quote as follows:

"We are delighted with Hamilton Hall. LEO has had a dramatic effect on our profitability: full implementation has created a 30% increase in revenue together with a 30% reduction in engineer costs and a 30% reduction in cost of material to support our business in the first year".

SAP Interface

At about the same time as buying LEO, the former parent company BCTel decided to buy SAP to replace all in-house legacy systems. LEO was seen as a stop gap solution until SAP was fully implemented. By 1999 the corporate view changed, as it was obvious that the LEO approach to planning and executing service provided the required flexibility to enable complex service and logistical operations. LEO's service industry focussed approach had won through and a new LEO-SAP billing interface was written and implemented.

Support

Hamilton Hall prides itself on providing unrivalled support to its customers. With the initial phases of the Telus project Hamilton Hall provided full on site support. This gradually moved to telephone and on-line support. Although Hamilton Hall can provide 24 hour support, through mutual agreement a late working shift at Hamilton Hall was established to cover the Telus working day. The eight hour time difference between the UK and British Columbia became an advantage. Telus began to log issues at the end of their working day by e-mail. Hamilton Hall, situated in the UK, was able to pick them up and work on them ready for Telus the following morning.

Finally, in 2002, Hamilton Hall added the LEO Support portal to their web site. This gives Telus their own personal page where they can log and review issues about LEO. It is tied into the internal Hamilton Hall software configuration management system so that up to date project status information can be retrieved.