Software Company Lands Sale by Proving
Scalability Through Expert Resources

“So often, a partnership is nothing more than a press release or a logo on a Web site, but Microsoft certainly backs up its partnerships by investing considerable time and resources.”

Stuart Plane, President, North America, Cadis Software

When software developer Cadis Software needed to prove its solution’s scalability to close a substantial sale, it turned to longtime partner Microsoft and a Microsoft® Technology Center. During a one-week proof-of-concept engagement, Cadis Software confirmed its solution’s viability and won the account. Along the way, it established greater credibility, optimized its solution, and fostered better relationships with its customer and Microsoft.

Business Needs

Cadis Software provides leading data management software and other financial technology solutions to the global asset management and investment banking community. The company is a Microsoft® Certified Partner and offers a comprehensive product suite that is highly flexible, scalable, and designed to support all asset types.

When a prospective customer—one of the world’s largest asset-management firms—underwent a selection process to find a data-management solution, it considered Cadis Software among its top three vendor options.

Cadis Softwares’ EDM Suite is specifically designed to help financial services companies with data management, processing, cleansing, and enrichment, so it made sense that Cadis Software was a contender.

However, Cadis Software built the EDM Suite to use a Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 64-bit database, whereas the competitive systems primarily used Oracle databases. “The customer was skeptical of implementing a Microsoft-based solution for such large scale, mission-critical use,” recalls Stuart Plane, President, North America, for Cadis Software. “We needed to prove that our solution could meet the customer’s scalability requirements with room to spare.” The partner also sought to show its potential customer that it was a credible vendor that received support from enterprise technology companies.

Solution

Cadis Software requested help from Microsoft through the Microsoft Partner Program and was offered use of a Microsoft Technology Center (MTC). “Microsoft jumped at the opportunity to assist us, and we were excited at the prospect of satisfying our prospective customer’s scalability requirements in a setting where we also could receive technical support from Microsoft experts,” says Plane. “We knew that the MTC was available to us for just this sort of competitive situation, so we took advantage of it the moment we needed it.”

Cadis Software attended a one-week proof-of-concept engagement at the Waltham, Massachusetts, MTC in late August 2006. Four Cadis Software attendees and one attendee from the potential customer spent time with MTC architects, working within an infrastructure that was specifically configured to test the scalability of CADIS. “The MTC architects handled all the logistics beforehand,” says Plane. “They created the technical environment and helped ensure that everyone understood the objectives of the sessions, which was critical to using our time wisely.”

Over the course of the MTC engagement, Cadis Software and its customer ran through the test scenarios that they had prepared ahead of time. These were designed to ensure that the solution would be tested in situations similar to those in the customer’s production scenario. CADIS met or exceeded all the service levels and scalability marks that the customer wanted to see. At the same time, the MTC architects helped Cadis Software refine its solution for increased performance. As a result, the customer chose CADIS and the first phase of the implementation went into production in January 2007.

Benefits

Cadis Software used its time at the MTC to improve the quality of its solution, increase its credibility with its prospective customer, and improve the level of collaboration among all parties. Says Plane, “Our time at the MTC cemented the relationship between not only Cadis Software and Microsoft, but between Cadis Software and our customer. The MTC was a key contributor to closing a substantial deal for our company.”

Access to resources. In addition to using the physical resources of the MTC, Cadis Software took advantage of the time with Microsoft experts to continue to learn about Microsoft technologies. “Getting to work in such a defined, structured environment with people who do this day in and day out was invaluable,” says Plane. “Having a clean environment and help from those with intimate knowledge of high-volume processing helped us accomplish our goals quickly. Plus, we gained a lot of insight as to the real core of SQL Server 2005 because we were talking to the experts—the whole MTC team was extremely professional and helpful.”

Increased credibility. The partner also found that conducting its tests alongside Microsoft made a difference in the customer’s perception of both Cadis Software and its solution. “It’s a powerful message to prospective customers that Microsoft is willing to make the MTC available to us,” says Plane. “Having Microsoft architects validate our testing in a well-defined environment was extremely helpful."

Enhanced solution. During the engagement, Cadis Software received suggestions from the MTC architects that helped the partner configure its solution to be even more effective. “We try to stay at the forefront of technology so that we can constantly make our solutions better,” says Plane. “We were able to make some configuration tweaks to CADIS to get the maximum benefit for our customers. The MTC gave us excellent visibility into the best way to optimize our solution for SQL Server 2005.”

Stronger relationships. According to Plane, the MTC experience strengthened the relationships among Cadis Software, Microsoft, and the customer. “I believe that witnessing the collaboration between the Cadis Software and Microsoft teams was as convincing to our customer as seeing our product and SQL Server 2005 running successfully,” concludes Plane. “So often, a partnership is nothing more than a press release or a logo on a Web site, but Microsoft certainly backs up its partnerships by investing considerable time and resources. Microsoft understands our business and what we’re trying to accomplish.”

© 2007 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS R IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.

Document published July 2007

Partner: Cadis Software
Web Site: www.cadisedm.com
Partner Size: 25 employees
Country or Region: United Kingdom
Industry: Financial Services Software

Partner Profile
London, United Kingdom–based Cadis Software develops and markets investment-management software tools and products for the financial services industry.

Software and Services

Microsoft^® Server Product Portfolio
- Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005
Technologies
- Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0
Services
- Microsoft Technology Center (MTC)

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