Government Ministry Standardizes on WebFOCUS to Provide Better Services to Senior Citizens and Disabled Individuals in Alberta

NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwire - June 2, 2009) - Information Builders, an independent leader in business intelligence (BI) solutions, and its iWay Software division, an innovator of enterprise integration solutions, today announced that the Ministry of Alberta Seniors and Community Supports has selected WebFOCUS as its operational business intelligence (BI) standard to support the Ministry's service to Alberta's seniors and disabled citizens. The Ministry is using the BI platform in conjunction with iWay's data adapters to provide more timely and effective services for senior citizens, such as spotting problems that delay payments, balancing the case load among processors, and maintaining greater accountability on taxpayer funds.

"Information Builders helped us understand how to get an immediate return on our BI investment with a plan for growing the system as our needs expand," said Chi Loo, assistant deputy minister for the Seniors Services Division. "We continue to refine the reporting architecture and enhance our ability to serve the community."

The BI system combines data from multiple information systems to quickly process requests and share information throughout the Ministry. iWay pulls data from multiple programs to provide a universal view of each client. This lets workers quickly access all data on each client, saving time and providing a formula for delivering a more complete array of social services. In the past, a worker might have had to combine data from multiple programs to obtain a complete picture of each individual. Now, if a senior citizen has multiple issues or questions, the processor can get universal data to handle all of the issues simultaneously.

The Ministry also uses WebFOCUS to create productivity reports that monitor how efficiently its agents are serving senior citizens. The agents use WebFOCUS to track how many cases are in their queues and whether or not they are on schedule to complete them. Supervisors view this same data at a higher level, enabling them to balance the workload as needed. In another area, the Ministry uses WebFOCUS to publish information about how well nursing homes and assisted living facilities comply with accommodation standards. This information is especially helpful to family members who reside outside of the area. The Ministry has also begun using WebFOCUS with GIS technology to display geographic data through interactive maps. In one instance, this visual depiction of the data helped the ministry identify a postal delivery problem that was delaying checks to seniors in some areas.

"The Ministry of Seniors and Community Supports is using BI technology for a noble mission: helping senior and disabled citizens to become more self-reliant and independent," said Gerald D. Cohen, president and CEO at Information Builders. "Their work demonstrates the value of harnessing information to better serve the community."

About Ministry of Alberta Seniors and Community Supports

Seniors and Community Supports, an Alberta provincial ministry, is responsible for developing and delivering programs and services to approximately 385,000 seniors and 37,000 disabled persons. The ministry provides financial benefits and other programs, administers the Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH) program, supplies community-based support for persons with developmental disabilities, and fosters the inclusion and independence of seniors and persons with disabilities.

About iWay Software

iWay Software's integration methodology is simple: it uses a single, integrated set of graphical design tools to assemble powerful pre-built components for enterprise-class business-to-business (B2B), business process automation (BPA), or enterprise information management (EIM) integration scenarios -- without the use of custom code. Integration configurations can be deployed in a stand-alone manner to any environment supporting a JVM -- or to Web application servers from any vendor. iWay delivers the fastest, most cost-effective, and simplest way to integrate and streamline critical business processes. iWay Software's vendor-, platform-, and protocol-neutral solutions achieve the promise of SOA: true reusability.

About Information Builders

Information Builders' award-winning combination of business intelligence and enterprise integration software has been providing innovative solutions to more than 12,000 customers for the past 34 years. WebFOCUS is the world's most widely utilized business intelligence platform. It provides the security, scalability and flexibility needed at every level of global extended enterprises. Its simplicity helps create executive, analytical, and operational applications that reach dozens to millions of users. Information Builders' iWay Software suite provides state of the art, multi-purpose, pre-built integration components that address all SOA, application, data and information management requirements. Its integration adapters have been adopted by the leading software platform providers. Together, these products give Information Builders' customers the ability to grow and innovate according to their needs.

Information Builders' customers include most of the Fortune 100 and U.S. federal government agencies. Headquartered in New York City with 90 offices worldwide, the company employs 1,450 people and has more than 350 business partners.

Contact Information: Press Contacts: Kathleen Moran Information Builders (917) 339-6313 Stephanie Fallon Emerge PR (617) 729-3176