August 2008: Founded in 1995, Singapore-based LGA Telecom provides unified communications, mobility and network security. In just a short span of time, LGA enjoys rapid growth and now has more than 2,000 customers. The company estimates that 20 percent of locally-listed companies use its services.

Manual workflow in early days

In the early days, workflow was mostly manual. Different departments – Marketing & Sales, Accounts & Billing, Contracts & Order Processing and Customer Support used multiple, disjointed legacy applications and collaborated via e-mail. Data was duplicated and resided in silos across the company.

The billing was also manual using a small proprietary business accounting software.

CEO Daniel Ang (picture) recalled having to refer to his personal calendar to take note of Re-Contract and Invoicing dates.

With rapid growth in business volume, LGA found it increasingly difficult to continue with this mostly manual workflow. New Customer Account Activation, Invoicing and Re-Contracts and Customer Support Management all required fast turnaround times. The existing system grew increasingly slow, error-prone and effort-intensive.

After several rounds of discussions with different vendors, and using a monolithic ERP system that failed to rectify the situation, LGA finally engaged iZeno to implement the Compiere ERP system.

Like any growing SMB, LGA needed a solution that delivered the necessary functionality and yet was cost-effective. The Compiere system was able to meet both requirements.

As a single, unified system serving all departments, Compiere makes the same data – or a single view of every customer – available to all departments. With all departments being able to access customer history, e-mail collaboration and manual record-keeping became unnecessary.

Faster order processing

Previously, Service Contract Management, Order Processing, Billing and Service Activation required manual collaboration between different departments. Compiere ERP helped integrate these processes so a single department could execute the entire process faster.

Multiple contract configurations are possible with Compiere with a few clicks, unlike the previous system where manual changes made the process far longer and error-prone.

Also, with direct access to the back-end infrastructure, the order-processing team itself is able to activate customer services. This leads to savings in time and manpower, removing inaccuracies and enabling faster customer service turnaround.

Efficient customer management was key. Without Compiere, LGA would probably have to double the support staff. Billing cycle is faster now even though volumes have increased by more than tenfold.

Empowering Marketing and Sales teams

Compiere provides high visibility on product sales with analytical tools that make reporting simpler. Marketing and Sales Managers can view timely sales information by product, by sales executive or other criteria.

Further benefits include faster Re-Contracts with the updated information available online round-the-clock, and automatic renewals where the customer contract has a provision for the same.

The integrated CRM application allows Marketing and Sales to collaborate seamlessly. Marketing can use mass mailing and promotions to targeted customers based on their sales histories and then inform Sales of opportunities for cross-selling and up-selling.

Faster customer support

With each customer’s history available online, the Help Desk is able to offer faster and personalised trouble-shooting. All information is updated immediately, so any member of the team is able to access a customer’s case management history and address the problem.

With a smaller team managing Customer Support, LGA was able to re-deploy resources to other departments and functions.

Top executives are able to monitor business position at any time. They can also customise their reports to analyse data by sales executives or by products.

As in all new system change-over, there were the initial road bumps in adopting the new application. The new interface was also somewhat challenging for the more senior staff who were used to the then existing legacy systems. Gradually, though, as they became familiar with the flexibility and advantages of Compiere, they adapted to the new system.

As senior executive Sharon Tan who was the company’s IT champion, says, “First they learnt to accept. Then they learnt to appreciate. Now we can’t imagine going back to the older system. Compiere has transformed us.”

CFO Tan Tiong Chye sums it up thus, “Compiere has done very well, and now we are looking at SugarCRM to add to the CRM functionality.” SugarCRM is iZeno’s open source CRM application.

Robust functionalities

Developed using J2EE technology, Compiere includes robust functionalities comprising extended ERP: sales, procurement, warehouse management, production management and financial management.

Business benefits include lower cost via open source edition with local professional support,

availability of source code that prevents vendor lock-in, faster ROI due to low initial capital outlay, companies “own” the software and make changes, and companies buy only the modules that they need.

As LGA’s CFO Tan puts it, “Without Compiere, additional support costs would be up to $300,000 extra every year – with slower speeds and errors.”

More on iZeno.

Developed using J2EE technology, Compiere includes robust functionalities comprising extended ERP: sales, procurement, warehouse management, production management and financial management (see screenshot).

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