Hosted Solution Delivers Over £800K Cost And Efficiency Savings In First Year

Windsor, Berks, 5 April 2011 - Pitney Bowes Business Insight (PBBI), a global leader in customer data, analytics and customer communication software and services, has successfully deployed and mobilised Confirm® OnDemand – PBBI’s on-demand asset maintenance and management system – for the Birmingham Highways Maintenance and Management Service, a £2.7bn project run by Amey in partnership with Birmingham City Council (BCC).

Following an ROI analysis comparing the costs of running its own data centre with using PBBI’s hosted solution, Amey chose Confirm OnDemand as the most cost-effective system for managing BCC’s highways network and assets. Amey is now benefiting from over £800K savings in infrastructure costs alone within the first year.

PBBI’s experience in rapidly planning and implementing the integration of on-demand solutions meant that Confirm OnDemand was up and running at Amey within one month.  This meant that Amey and BCC were quickly able to enjoy the cost and efficiency benefits of moving to a hosted environment, reducing capital expenditure on hardware and software, and simplifying ongoing support and maintenance.  Savings have also been made through the consolidation of 72 systems into 25, with Confirm OnDemand driving this integration.

Adrian Annabel, IT solutions consultant at Amey, said, “PBBI’s hosted solution has saved us over £800K in the first year by removing both the need to purchase traditional licences and invest in our own Confirm infrastructure.   

“On-demand means that we avoid the capital spike traditionally associated with major software deployments, with a regular ongoing fee being much easier to manage on the balance sheet. Furthermore, because the system is hosted by PBBI, upgrades, configuration and data transfer are seamless and risk-free.  We are extremely impressed with the speed in which Confirm has delivered tangible cost and efficiency benefits.”

In addition, Amey is also saving up to £100K per annum in productivity and transport costs by deploying the Confirm software on PDAs. This has enabled officers to carry out their highways inspections, write reports and raise jobs in the field without having to travel back to the office to duplicate this data. The on-demand solution enabled the rapid mobilisation of Confirm, with workers able to access the system from day one of it going live.

Annabel continued, “The efficient management of Birmingham’s highways presents an enormous challenge in the city’s quest to become a world-class city by 2026. The PBBI team has worked extremely closely with us to deliver a scalable, on-demand solution.”
The partnership between Amey and BCC is the UK’s largest in the local government highways sector, and is aimed at improving the city’s infrastructure.  Amey is using Confirm for the effective delivery of highways asset management and maintenance services, covering 2,500km of road network, 100,000 street lights, 80,000 trees and over 1,000 bridges, structures and tunnels.

The deployment of Confirm in such a short timeframe was all the more challenging because of the sheer diversity and scale of data involved and the need to work and implement changes within a live environment.  Within one month, BCC data has been successfully cleansed and reconfigured after extensive business process reviews by PBBI.  With better quality data running across a more tightly integrated system, Amey is able to improved public services to Birmingham’s citizens.

In addition to helping Amey manage and maintain the city's highways and assets via a centralised system and database, Confirm has also made it significantly easier for members of the public to report any faults or issues with the municipal environment and for Amey to expedite an appropriate response.