Cross-industry

Feature:

It’s all about the partners

14 July 2010

Blending expertise in industry and technology, Microsoft partners around the world help customers get more from IT.

It’s one thing to create a software and services platform capable of running a business, but it’s another thing entirely to tailor that platform to run a bank, or a school, or a small retail store. That’s why Microsoft relies on an ecosystem of more than 640,000 Microsoft partners, whose role is to understand the needs of specific industries and customers, and design IT systems accordingly.

Each year, the Microsoft Partner of the Year Awards recognise those who have made a difference in creating the right solutions for customers. As senior director of Microsoft’s Worldwide Partner Group, Pam Salzer is one of the administrators of the awards programme. In the course of her work, Salzer has seen firsthand how a real understanding of customers and industries can enhance the value of just about any technology.

“Every organisation is unique, with a structure, culture and staff unlike any other,” Salzer says. “Every industry has different requirements, regulations and markets.”

This week Microsoft showcased the 2010 Partners of the Year at the Worldwide Partner Conference in Washington, D.C. Salzer says what really makes this group stand out is their ability to help companies of all shapes and sizes do better business.

This year’s class includes some interesting stories of partners who took the Microsoft platform a little farther

Pam Salzer, Microsoft “This year’s class includes some interesting stories of partners who took the Microsoft platform a little farther,” Salzer says, “whether by building a new approach to suit a particular industry, or simply through outstanding customer service.”

Such is the case with Jack Henry & Associates, a 35-year-old independent software vendor (ISV) that primarily works in the financial services market. Jack Henry was recognised as ISV Solution Partner of the Year.

Developers at Jack Henry & Associates have spent a lot of time working with technical specialists at Microsoft Technical Centers. Tommy Bradford, managing director for the strategic alliance group says working closely with Microsoft has paid off, helping Jack Henry & Associates build solid, reliable solutions that are now being used in banks around the globe.

In the world of IT, product development never stops, and Bradford says Jack Henry & Associates is continuing to innovate. The company is looking to integrate the upcoming Windows Phone 7 platform into its mobile banking solution, and is also looking to make better use of the cloud, exploring ways to make the Azure platform work for banks by deploying it in a way that meets the industry’s stringent regulatory requirements regarding customer information.

“We have six data centres where we host applications, and are looking at mixed models where we secure the data on our side and then use the Azure processing power,” he says.

The ultimate goal could be a virtually ‘serverless’ bank, he says, where the institution doesn’t need to worry about backing up data, versioning applications, security or other IT concerns.

“We offer a service that monitors the network traffic and raises an alarm if there’s activity that shouldn’t be there,” Bradford says. “Basically we want to let a bank be a bank and focus on making loans, deposits and doing what they do best, instead of worrying about IT.”

The power of combining deep industry knowledge with cutting-edge technology was also demonstrated by Brazilian ISV Gestar Tecnologia para Educação, a Microsoft Dynamics partner that won Public Sector/Education Partner of the Year. Gestar Tecnologia para Educação has adapted the Microsoft Dynamics CRM platform for use by educational institutions in managing the life cycle of their relations with students, from application to matriculation to graduation.

According to Moacyr Galo, president of Gestar Tecnologia para Educação, the Gestar student relationship management (SRM) product is “basically the adaptation of the CRM concept to the education market – allowing educational systems to work differently with different groups of students.”

Gestar Tecnologia para Educação’s solution is able to integrate the typically disparate systems used by academic institutions to manage different phases of student relationships. The result is a centralised database inside Microsoft Dynamics CRM that consolidates student information so the school can create processes to improve academic results.

“Based on all the information we collect – grades, absences, test scores and such – the school can create groups of students based on performance and start processes to manage each situation,” Galo says. “Perhaps you have students with difficulties in reading or math. The school district can easily find those students and trigger interventions on those groups.”

The cherry on top of the system, Galo says, is a slick visual interface that Gestar Tecnologia para Educação developed using Microsoft Silverlight, which also allows the schools to incorporate pictures and put faces with names. He says the Silverlight interface combined with familiar Office functionality helps when it comes to driving adoption among educators.

According to Microsoft’s Salzer, all of the 2010 Partners of the Year demonstrate the one unifying principle that brings them together on the dais this week – the ability to translate customer needs into dynamic technology solutions.

Check out the rest of our WPC 2010 news in our special event section.

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