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Avotus Develops “New Standard” for Tracking Company Spending on Wireless and Mobile Services
TMCnet Associate Editor
In the pay-as-you-go world of mobile communications, most companies are allowing their employees to contract their own services - and then bill as they go along. Under this highly decentralized (and often poorly regulated) process, there often is no clear corporate “owner” of the spend category - and policies, if they are defined, are both difficult and unpopular to enforce. The result is significant - and often undetected - overspending and misuse.
That’s what has led Avotus Corporation, a provider of communications expense management (TEM) and e-Procurement solutions, to add enhanced mobile and wireless management (MWM) capabilities to its integrated Intelligent Communications Management (ICM) solution. The solution fully integrates mobile and wireless communications, including cell phones, Blackberries, PDAs and other devices, into a single spend management environment.
Avotus ICM allows customers to select a range of services to address sourcing and procurement, inventory, cost and usage. The software allows managed services to quickly register all mobile users and devices, capture existing carrier and plan information, and determine reimbursement and/or use policies. It also enables a company to quickly develop a full request for proposal (RFP) for the required services and products, obtain the best possible rates through a specialized online Web auction, and generate a contract ready for review - in much less time than through any other method. In addition, individual rate plans can be automatically reviewed, analyzed, and adjusted to fully optimize mobile and wireless costs, thus creating what the company calls “a new standard for best practices” in communications procurement.
Going a step further, Avotus ensures that negotiated savings are implemented and realized over the life of a contract. Using automated invoice validation, each bill is analyzed to ensure contract compliance. Asset-level purchasing is similarly automated as is the enforcement of corporate policies.
Avotus claims it has the only fully integrated mobile/wireless management system that can capture, record and integrate wireless communications costs with other corporate communications expense lines. By feeding data to corporate enterprise resource management systems, wireless costs are allocated in the same way as other corporate expenses.
Avotus also provides Web-based and call center support for all user services and technical needs - and also offers a Web portal that accommodates individual procurement requirements (equipment, carriers, plan, etc.) within the context of corporate policy.
“Virtually every company has a huge challenge with their wireless spend whether they realize it or not,” said Alan Gold, Avotus chief marketing officer, in a news release. “And by its very nature - decentralized and distributed use, frequent device turnover, fragmented carrier coverage - it is perhaps the least well-managed part of an enterprise’s overall communications spend. The opportunity for savings and control is immense.”
For more information about Avotus, visit www.avotus.com.
Patrick Barnard is Associate Editor for TMCnet and a columnist covering the telecom industry. To see more of his articles, please visit Patrick Barnard’s columnist page
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