Utah’s Software and IT Industry Continues to Innovate and Expand

February 8th, 2012 by simran No comments »
Share

Digital media in Utah is a vibrant force behind the state’s economic vitality. Recently, GigaOM, a leading provider of online research for global technology innovators, analyzed data from Google Insights for Search to determine regional interest in technology, they were intrigued to find Utah near the top in several areas. The search interest data gathered by GigaOM for its story on U.S. tech hotspots aligns Utah with the nation’s epicenters of technology in Silicon Valley and Boston.

Nowhere is this growing IT leadership more apparent than in the electronic gaming segment of the industry. Utah’s digital prowess means that for Facebook gamers with sights set on world domination, their time has come courtesy of Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) who recently launched its newly developed social gaming version of RISK: Factions.

The EA adaptation of Hasbro’s popular RISK game has added a new dimension in social gaming which exemplifies the collaborative effort and knowledge base of Utah’s IT industry and next-generation programmers and software developers.

“The dynamic industry-leading digital media business in Utah has provided employment for hundreds of our graduates in dozens of firms creating digital content ranging from film and television to video games and computer modeling,” said Gov. Gary R. Herbert. “The comprehensive IT cluster that houses digital media is a global force providing for thousands of high-paying local jobs at the world’s foremost tech companies.”

“RISK: Factions is an imaginative reinvention of Hasbro’s iconic strategy board game. I believe it is the first major Facebook game to be developed in Salt Lake and we are proud to note that we built it here,” said Jon Dean, vice president and executive producer at EA Interactive. “It reinforces that we have the right creative people here, able to apply their skills and innovate on relevant technology.”

Interactive online games and digital media developed by Utah’s digital media creators such as EA are key long-term contributors to the state’s dynamic Software Development & Information Technology economic cluster, one of the Governor’s Office of Economic Development’s (GOED) seven targeted economic clusters. Utah’s software and IT cluster features such industry luminaries as Adobe, Oracle and EMC — companies that continually drive innovation in digital technology that makes Utah a competitive force in the industry.

Like EA, other IT giants in Utah such as eBay and IM Flash are committed to expanding their customer base and local presence through new and evolving business models and platforms. EA Salt Lake’s own drive to innovate and stay competitive has produced an impressive suite of popular family titles across all major console and handheld media platforms as well as for mobile and social gaming platforms.

EA’s state-of-the-art, custom-designed Salt Lake City studio that employs a team of designers, artists, programmers, producers and project managers is situated amidst the newly revitalized downtown Salt Lake City, and supports Utah’s own IT and software cluster growth. The technology industry currently employs more than 44,000 people around the State.

Source:http://www.utahbusiness.com/issues/articles/12047/2012/02/utah___s_software_and_it_industry_continues_to_innovate_and_expand

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Guidance Software Acquires CaseCentral

February 8th, 2012 by simran No comments »
Share

Pasadena-based Guidance Software, which develops digital forensics and e-discovery software, said Tuesday afternoon that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire CaseCentral, a developer of electronic discovery software. Guidance Software said it will pay $17.1M for CaseCentral, with up to $33M in earn out. The deal is split between $8.3M in cash and $8.3M in Guidance Software common stock. Guidance Software said it expects to add approximately $10M in software-as-a-service revenues from the acquisition in 2012. The acquisition brings the total number of employees at Guidance Software to nearly 500. CaseCentral was based in San Francisco. Guidance said it was represented in the acquisition by Atlas Technology Group.

Source:http://www.socaltech.com/guidance_software_acquires_casecentral/s-0040864.html

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Asure Software Announces Time Clock Subscription Program for Workplace Management Solutions

February 8th, 2012 by simran No comments »
Share

Asure Software, Inc. , a leading provider of workplace management software, today announced that it is offering a monthly time clock subscription program as part of its time and labor management solution offering.

“Asure Software’s time clock subscription program is in line with our business strategy to deliver flexible cloud solutions to our client base, and we are very excited to offer our clients a subscription program that lowers their cost of capital,” said Pat Goepel, Asure’s Chief Executive Officer. “Companies of all sizes want to be assured that their capital investment will result in improved business operations. With newfound savings, they can focus on initiatives that impact their core business.”

Christian Cowan, Asure’s Vice President of Marketing, added, “Asure’s innovative, proprietary time clocks seamlessly integrate with our time and labor management software and provide easy upgrades, simple deployment and remote access to our clients. Our goal is to offer solutions that align with our clients’ ever-changing needs, and the time clock subscription program does just that.”

The time clock subscription program consists of bar code, proximity card, and biometric data input options in two models: The 400 series model provides a 4.3-inch display with keypad data input; and the 700 series provides a 7-inch display with touch-screen data input.

Source:http://eon.businesswire.com/news/eon/20120207005302/en/time-clock/time-and-labor/time-and-labor-management

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Rocket Software’s $300 Million Dividend Loan Rises in Trading

February 8th, 2012 by simran No comments »
Share

Rocket Software Inc.’s $300 million term loan to fund a dividend to Court Square Capital Partners rose in initial trading, according to data provider Markit Group Ltd.
The six-year debt first exchanged hands at 99.88 cents on the dollar, according to Markit. The financing for the developer of business software was sold to investors at 98 cents on the dollar, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Credit Suisse Group AG arranged the financing for the Newton, Massachusetts-based company, the data show. The loan pays interest at 5.5 percentage points more than the London interbank offered rate, with a 1.5 percent floor on the benchmark.

Court Square, a New York-based private-equity firm, acquired Rocket Software for an undisclosed amount in September 2009, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
In a revolving credit facility, money can be borrowed again once it’s repaid; in a term loan, it can’t.

Source:http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-07/rocket-software-s-300-million-dividend-loan-rises-in-trading.html

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Knoa Software Expands Executive Team with Addition of Michael Zuckerman as Chief

February 8th, 2012 by simran No comments »
Share

Knoa® Software, the leading provider of end-user management software, today announced the expansion of its executive team with the addition of Michael Zuckerman as chief marketing officer and vice president. Zuckerman brings more than 20 years of senior level marketing, sales and operations management experience in software, Internet and related technologies. Reporting to Knoa Software Chief Executive Officer Thad Eidman, Zuckerman will drive the company’s strategic marketing efforts to support its rapidly increasing customer, partner and sales momentum.

“Mike brings very significant experience in high tech marketing, business development and related strategic development. He has been the senior marketing officer in three highly successful, publicly traded companies and has the experience and skillset to help us deliver our vision for our customers and partners.”
“As our expansion continues, we need to bolster our capability on all fronts for our senior executive team,” said Eidman. “Mike brings very significant experience in high tech marketing, business development and related strategic development. He has been the senior marketing officer in three highly successful, publicly traded companies and has the experience and skillset to help us deliver our vision for our customers and partners.”

Knoa’s Experience and Performance Management (EPM) solution provides total monitoring coverage of end-user behavior and experience for leading enterprise solutions including the SAP NetWeaver® Portal, the SAP® Customer Relationship Management (SAP CRM) application and SAP BusinessObjects™ solutions, as well as Oracle Siebel CRM®. Knoa EPM delivers precise metrics about application performance, as well as an unprecedented level of visibility into how end-users are interacting with the application. With this insight, application support teams can pinpoint and help address application, system and end-user performance issues and identify opportunities for further training.

“Knoa is well positioned to take advantage of many opportunities. The return on investment for our products can be realized in perhaps as little as a few months,” said Zuckerman. “This presents a compelling reason for customers to implement the solution – especially in the current economy. Further, our partnership with SAP and experience with SAP solutions enables us to well serve the needs of customers on a global basis. All of this creates an exciting opportunity. I look forward to contributing to the next stage of Knoa’s development, leadership and success.”

Before joining Knoa, Zuckerman was chief marketing officer for Queplix Corp., a data integration company. Prior to that, he held positions as senior vice president, marketing, at I-Many, Inc. (Nasdaq:IMNY), in the contract management software market and a position as senior vice president, marketing and senior vice president, general manager for the 3D business unit of Immersion (Nasdaq:IMMR). Zuckerman also served as vice president of worldwide marketing at Verity, Inc. (Nasdaq:VRTY), in the enterprise search market, ultimately acquired by Autonomy (AU).

Source:http://eon.businesswire.com/news/eon/20120207005490/en/Knoa-Software/end-user-mangament/Mike-Zukerman

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Kenexa acquires Boston software company

February 8th, 2012 by Amrinder No comments »
Share

Kenexa, the human resources management software and services company, announced an agreement to acquire privately held OutStart, a provider of e-learning software and services. Terms were not announced.

OutStart, which is based in Boston and has offices in North America, Europe and Asia, has more than 300 customers ranging from large global organizations to midsize companies and government entities. The company said it delivers a portfolio of interrelated mobile, social and learning knowledge solutions.

Kenexa said the acquisition will expand its reach into the e-learning market and enable Kenexa to provide a broader and deeper suite of talent management solutions.

Kenexa, based in Wayne, Pa., has operations in Lincoln that employ more than 350 people.

Kenexa Chairman Rudy Karsan said in a news release: “We have the leading talent acquisition solution for large organizations, and we launched our performance management suite last year as well. With the addition of OutStart’s capabilities, Kenexa will be able to offer customers an award-winning suite of (Software as a Service) learning solutions, plus learning expertise and a great team with more than a decade of experience in learning management.”

Software as Service is a distribution model in which applications are hosted by a service provider and made available to customers over a network.

Kenexa said it expects to pay for the acquisition with its existing cash balance, and it expects the transaction to be at least neutral to non-GAAP net income available to common shareholders for 2012.

Source:http://journalstar.com/business/local/kenexa-acquires-boston-software-company/article_12cbef1c-a508-56d9-9bae-7864ff918978.html

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Microsoft to release native mobile apps for its CRM software

February 8th, 2012 by Amrinder No comments »
Share

Microsoft is gearing up to release a phalanx of native mobile applications for its CRM software, with clients aimed at BlackBerry, Windows Phone 7, iOS, and Android 2.2 and higher devices, the company announced yesterday.

The release, which is scheduled for the second quarter as part of Microsoft’s regular CRM (customer relationship management) service update, will also build on existing browser support with Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox and Safari, running on Macs, iPads and Windows PCs.

In the future the native mobile applications will be updated at the same time, but features and functions may vary depending on the relative capabilities available on each platform, said Craig Dewar, director, Dynamics CRM.

“We’re doing as much as we can on each platform, and not choosing to do the lowest common denominator approach. We’re optimising for the device. You chose that device, and we should light it up as much as possible,” he said.

The new CRM mobile capabilities also include a hosted-server component that provides management and security, including the ability to remotely wipe devices of sensitive data should they become compromised. IT administrators will also be able to “mobilise” all of their CRM customizations without having to re-code them, Dewar said.

Each native application will allow for offline usage and data synchronisation with online systems, according to a statement.

Microsoft is charging $30 per user per month for the mobile service, with each subscription allowed up to three devices. It is a purely user-based pricing model, with no separate fee for the hosted-server tools.

Meanwhile, Microsoft’s close CRM competitor Salesforce.com offers a Lite mobile application at no charge, with the full-featured version available at no additional cost for Unlimited Edition subscribers but $50 per user per month for Professional and Enterprise edition customers.

While other CRM vendors, including Salesforce.com, have moved quickly to embrace HTML5 for mobile in hopes of writing a single rich application that will run on multiple platforms, Microsoft is taking a more deliberate pace.

“We’re watching HTML5 very closely, we’re working on it. It’s a very important development technology. But our focus is to provide the best possible experience on native devices today,” Dewar said.

Microsoft will likely do more with HTML5 upon the arrival of Windows 8, which will provide ample support for it, he added.

Another feature planned for the upcoming service update, which will apply to both the on-premises and online versions of the software, is Activity Feeds, which provides users with a familiar Twitter and Facebook-like stream of updates on information in the CRM system.

Microsoft is also planning to add new BI (business intelligence) capabilities to the on-premises version, which are based on the Power View visualisation technology in SQL Server 2012. Those capabilities will become available in the online version over time, Dewar said.

Source:http://www.computernewsme.com/2012/02/microsoft-to-release-native-mobile-apps-for-its-crm-software/

No comments »

Posted in Software News

Tags:

Get Adobe Flash playerPlugin by wpburn.com wordpress themes