Maestro*Liaison February 2007
Return to News CenterThe future: integrating operations
Information systems first appeared on the scene in the 1970s. Over the next 20 years, every problem or challenge faced by companies were solved with a specific application. Companies could choose from among hundreds of accounting systems, project management applications, applications for planning, production, inventory management, payroll and so forth. If no solution was available, we could always rely on spreadsheets, such as Visicalc, Lotus or Microsoft Excel, which is still one of the most widely used applications in corporate settings.
Solutions were usually found in one of the following three areas:
Accounting functions
(general ledger, accounts receivable, accounts payable, bank reconciliation, etc.).
Operational financial functions (project costs, inventory, orders, specialized billing,
etc.).
Operational functions (project planning, document management, contact management,
sales analysis, CRM, etc.).
Gradually, there was a consolidation between the level of the product offering and the level of integrated functions in a given application. Today, most products address much more than a single corporate function. In fact, while there are still products that are strictly for accounting purposes, most of them handle are fairly broad range of operational financial functions. The same is true for project planning and management products that run an increasing number of operational financial functions.
Thus, the trend is to level off earlier segmentation resulting in products that meet all of a company’s requirements. The objective is to integrate all operations to optimize communication, substantially reduce errors and optimize the work of users, notably with unique entries and by sharing information.
Maestro is not to be outdone. Over the last 20 years, our goal has been to monitor market requirements, the demands of our customers, and the opportunities provided by the new technologies. We have continued improving our modules in the financial operations segment, and we have updated new products that meet the requirements of operations management, particularly with contact management, document management and field event management.
This said, there will always be more specialized requirements that are more difficult to meet. This is why we invested in an interface to communicate between applications named ’XML interface’. This interface allows third-party applications to communicate directly with information from Maestro, in both read and write mode and in a secure environment. Many partners are already using this communication method to meet their requirements as varied as manufacturing management (note automation), mobile service (APEX), concrete plans (Marcotte), the manufacturing of doors and windows (MecInov), custom development (Vertisoft) and estimating (Luqs/Gesquan). Furthermore, we can import files from many other types of products, such as scale tickets and various estimating software packages.
Rest assured that in the coming years, as in the past, the Maestro team will continue to invest in its products to meet the constantly changing requirements of its customers and the market.
Robert Meunier, President 01/02/07
