J.D. Edwards’ Outsourced Applications Help Construction Projects Stay on Time, On Budget

Outsourcing Flexible Software That Puts Ideas Into Action Quickly and Provides Relief from IT Staffing Shortage, Costly Upgrades
Instant Reporting Allow Accurate Prediction of Closing Dates

DENVER, Jan. 25, 1999 — Enterprise business software provider J.D. Edwards & Company (NASDAQ: JDEC), announced today that its ERP Outsourcing program provides enterprise software services to three top leading construction companies through its partner, World Technology Services (WTS).

IREX Corp., Hathaway Dinwiddie Construction Group, and J.R. Abbott Construction Company have all chosen to lease J.D. Edwards enterprise software from WTS to meet IT staffing shortage challenges, focus on core business competencies and gain more timely, more accurate reporting capabilities, and access to critical information.

IREX Corp. faced a shortage of trained IBM AS/400® professionals and also needed costly hardware upgrades. With its on-site IBM AS/400 lease running out, IREX turned to outsourcing for the cost flexibility and to relieve the pressure of finding trained professionals in a tight job market.

"By outsourcing our J.D. Edwards WorldSoftware™ with WTS, we don't have to worry about the availability of skilled IT candidates and we still enjoy the benefits of a flexible enterprise software solution that can grow and change as we do," said Lori Pickell, treasurer and MIS director of IREX Corp.

The IREX MIS department supports two unique disciplines: construction and distribution. "One of the reasons we chose J.D. Edwards software was its ability to handle both construction and distribution applications in one integrated software solution," Pickell said. "In WorldSoftware, everything from payroll to job cost and inventory to sales orders is integrated to provide us the up-to-date information necessary to manage our business."

Hathaway Dinwiddie Construction Group also weighed outsourcing against costly hardware upgrades, and additional overhead costs such as programming expenses and additional staff. "When we looked at outsourcing, it came down to two issues – confidence in the application and confidence in the service element, that the provider could work with the unique needs of the construction industry," said Dave Miller, controller at Hathaway. "Our confidence in outsourcing WorldSoftware applications with WTS met those needs for us. We can now produce reports that provide critical data to keep construction projects on time and budget, instantly. Previously, they could take up to six weeks to produce. Also, the speed of change that the software can handle has helped us tremendously – we merged with another company and were able to integrate it and bring a new company into our existing IT infrastructure in only three months."

J.R. Abbott Construction also needed access to real time information, but wanted to focus less on technology issues and more on positioning itself strategically for the future and on its core business of construction. "We have project managers on the job nationwide that need real-time data to forecast job costs for period-end closings," said Art Solbakken, executive vice president at J.R. Abbott.

"J.D. Edwards software allows seamless forecasting for our project managers and as a result, they can provide faster, more confident closing schedules. The combination of WTS’ skills and J.D. Edwards’ WorldSoftware gives our project managers such a huge toolbox to choose from, they hardly know which tool to pick," added Solbakken. J.R. Abbott can also access suppliers’ account status and provide access to project data, both in real-time, for remote jobs over dedicated and/or dial-up connections.

WTS, a Seattle-based network and application hosting, integration and support company, provides application outsourcing services to companies nationwide including construction, engineering, manufacturing and distribution.

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