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Allows Improved Visibility to Increase Margins
Vancouver, BC and London, ON, February 17, 2004 - Emco Corporation, one of Canada's leading distributors and manufacturers of building materials for the residential, commercial and industrial construction markets, has licensed Antarctica's Visual Net software, to help analyze and manage profit margins, a critical driver of performance in any distribution organization. "Despite receiving hundreds of reports and spreadsheets from our existing information systems, it is difficult for us to quickly see which customer segments, branches and product lines are meeting their margin targets - and more importantly why," explains Rick Fantham, President, Emco Distribution. "Our business users can not easily obtain the critical information they need without relying on our IT staff to produce it for them or having to write their own complicated queries. This bottleneck reduces our speed and results. Additionally we have invested more resources in analysis than action, and action is what delivers results."
"With Visual Net, our business users will be able to 'see' where we are not meeting our margin targets and quickly 'drill down' into areas that they want to investigate. Our first application has been deployed and we expect it to have a real bottom line impact within one quarter. We expect improved margins, as well as real cost savings by eliminating hundreds of reports and redeploying resources currently consumed with the production and distribution of those reports. In the coming months, we plan to roll out multiple applications in the areas of procurement, finance, logistics, and customer support to as many as 1700 users. Ultimately we hope to extend the application to our customers and vendors as well. It is all about speed and execution to deliver results," Fantham added.
"Emco, like many organizations, is drowning in data. Yet even with all that data, key executives and business users were not able to quickly gain insight into their business to make better decisions," states Barry Yates, President & CEO of Antarctica Systems Inc. "Their existing tools were geared towards the 'power users' and did not provide the critical information that the majority of 'business users' need to make better decisions. By putting this critical information in the hands of their key business users and making the key issues and exceptions very visible, Emco will be able to make quicker, better informed decisions."
Visual Net enables Emco users from Executives to Branch Managers to Warehouse employees the ability to drill down through a series of visual maps to gain a deeper understanding of what's going on in the business. With Visual Net:
- Size, shape, color and other visual cues are used to convey important details, so users can identify, at a glance, areas where margin targets are not being met with the largest issues floating to the top of the maps.
- Macro and micro views are presented simultaneously. Users can see as much or as little detail as they would like, while maintaining a shared, "big picture" view of the overall margin situation. For example, on one map Visual Net can display an overview of twenty million purchase order lines while highlighting the key areas where users should focus their attention.
- Users have access to multiple dimensions of data, on one screen, so they no longer need to access several reports and applications to investigate key issues.
Available immediately, Visual Net is 100% Web-enabled and can be deployed in only a few weeks.
About Emco
Emco Distribution is one of Canada's leading distributors of plumbing, waterworks, heating and industrial products for the residential, commercial and industrial construction markets. Emco Corporation was initially incorporated in Ontario, Canada in 1906 as The Empire Manufacturing Company Limited. Emco primarily serves the residential, renovation and new construction markets, as well as the commercial and industrial construction markets.
About Antarctica Systems Inc.
Antarctica Systems Inc. is a Business Analytics software provider founded by XML co-creator and Open Text Inc. founder, Tim Bray. Antarctica’s mission is to provide the last mile of Business Intelligence. Its flagship solution, Visual Net, is an intuitive and visual console geared specifically towards the business users. It allows them to explore and investigate their businesses in order to understand root causes of performance, identify threats and opportunities and answer the question 'why.’ Visual Net also enables users to explore and distill vast amounts of data, shifting their focus from analysis to insight and action.
The company is privately held with headquarters in Vancouver, B.C. and sales offices across North America. For additional information, please visit www.antarctica.net.
Antarctica and Visual Net are trademarks or registered trademarks of Antarctica Systems Inc. in Canada and foreign countries. All other referenced trademarks belong to their respective owners.
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