Why invest in custom software?
As you innovate within your organization, and as the world around you changes, your
information processing needs will change. You may find that as a result of these
dynamics your current IT systems have become insufficient. When this happens it
is time to upgrade them in order to remain competitive. If your industry is saturated
with competitors there's a good chance that you will be able to find a worthy COTS solution. But what do you do when your own
innovation has taken you so far off the beaten path that there simply is no sufficient
COTS solution? Why, you develop the solution yourself… with our help, of
course.
Just like any other improvement to your organization's infrastructure, custom software
represents an investment in your future success. Custom software is often a terrific
way to acquire a unique capability, and therefore a significant competitive advantage.
However, it is the most expensive way to acquire software because the development
costs are not spread across many users, as they are with simple commercial software
and COTS products. Whenever we are engaged to develop custom software we first search
to make sure there is no other, cheaper way to acquire the same solution. Once this
has been established we proceed with a formal approach to developing your solution.
This formal approach consists of a series of phases:
- Requirements analysis - where we determine exactly what the solution must
do
- Design - we base a system architecture and user interface design on the requirements
- Implementation - turning the carefully planned vision into a reality
- Testing - verification that what we have built actually meets your needs
- Deployment - integrating the new solution with your existing organization
- Support - we are always available to help resolve any issues you may have
Why do we use this formal, step-wise approach? Quite simply, because it is the only
way to ensure that your money is well spent, which is always our first priority.