Thames Water Selects ClickSoftware for Optimized Mobile Workforce Management

BURLINGTON, Mass., May 16, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- ClickSoftware Technologies Ltd. (NasdaqGS: CKSW), the leading provider of automated workforce management and optimization solutions for the service industry, today announced that the UK's largest water and wastewater services company, Thames Water, has selected the ClickSoftware ServiceOptimization Suite. Thames Water identified ClickSoftware's workforce management and mobility platform as the key technologies to ensure significant improvements in the efficient use of its workforce, its assets and the quality of service that it provides to its customers through optimized scheduling of its 2,000-strong field force and contractors.

Thames Water is under significant, industry-wide pressure from the Water Services Regulation Authority (OFWAT) to deliver value for its 13.8 million customers' money during the current five-year Asset Management Planning (AMP) period.  The most effective way to comply with OFWAT whilst improving customer service levels is by optimizing the activities of its 2,000 field-based staff.

"Workforce management technology will give us the edge in maximizing the performance of our field operations and, at the same time, help to reduce our back office costs and meet our regulatory commitments," said Andrew Bilecki, Chief Information Officer at Thames Water.

"Following a rigorous European tender process, we selected ClickSoftware as it is the best fit for our functional and technical requirements. Given the rapid mobility advancements over the last couple of years, we wanted to ensure we had the best mobile solution in order to mobilize SAP processes into the field and support our workforce with the right data at the right time," Bilecki added.

The ServiceOptimization Suite will provide a full, integrated view of activities across the entire service chain. Prior to selecting ClickSoftware, Thames Water had been using a variety of solutions to manage its mobile workforce. As part of the SAP Workforce and Asset Management Information (WAMI) transformation program, Thames Water selected ClickSoftware's ServiceOptimization Suite including ClickMobile built on top of the Sybase Mobility Platform.  

ClickSoftware's mobility solution built on top of the Sybase Mobility Platform will enable Thames Water to mobilize SAP asset management processes, ensure tight integration with their ESRI GIS system and allow them to capture timesheets and asset related data from the field. In addition, the mobility solution has tight integration to ClickSoftware's ServiceOptimization Suite ensuring that the decision-making and optimized dispatch process becomes fully automated.  This approach will lead Thames Water towards becoming a real-time service enterprise - a concept pioneered by ClickSoftware.

It is envisaged that ClickSoftware's mobile field service platform will be a leap forward for field communications and the business.

"ClickMobile allows us to bring the significant investment we have made in SAP enterprise technology to our service technicians in the field," said Phil Barker, WAMI Program Director at Thames Water. "Information about consecutive jobs is automatically pushed to technicians' mobile devices, including any notes from previous visits, site maps, and asset data. Through the integrated workflows, work orders, timesheets, customer information and asset inspection data can be fed back into SAP's Asset Management and CRM system.  The field technician will also have access to the back office systems via ClickMobile in order to better service the customer, for example creating appointments and follow-up orders from the field or completing customer satisfaction surveys," he added.  

The mobile solution will also allow field supervisors to monitor in real time their team members' daily progress, help supervisors provide scheduling assistance to the field workers, complete crew timesheets, download attachments and manuals, capture and upload digital photos and run performance management.  The ClickMobile and SAP Portal will be tightly integrated and therefore field technicians will be able to run, from ClickMobile, self-service functions such as holiday requests, knowledge management and collaboration.    

The proven scheduling and mobility applications from ClickSoftware running directly on the industry's leading mobility infrastructure from Sybase (An SAP Company), will make a significant contribution to the predicted cost savings and operational efficiencies through reduced administration and freeing up time for technicians to concentrate on field operations and customer service.  For wireless connection management and VPN, ClickMobile will be utilizing the BirdStep SafeMove application.  For device management and security Sybase Afaria is tightly integrated with ClickMobile.  

ClickContact will provide better end customer communication and service through email, SMS, telephone and the availability of narrow appointment windows to customers via the Thames Water website. ClickSchedule will automatically optimize the deployment of resources for proactive and reactive maintenance, making sure that the right engineer arrives at the appointed time with the skills and tools to get the job done first time. ClickLocate will give dispatch teams clear real-time visibility of all technicians' locations and provide field workers with lone worker capability and therefore back office staff are able to monitor workers and their safety and raise the alarm if the mobile worker is in potential danger. ClickAnalyze will then collect all operational data and provide executives and management with insight into where operations can be progressively improved creating further scope for cost efficiencies.

"Our optimized scheduling and planning solutions have, for a number of years, been the de facto choice for organizations with large, complex mobile workforces. The selection of our workforce management and mobility platform is further evidence that when it comes to supporting enterprise mobility programs, ClickSoftware has the most complete technology, experience and methodology to ensure their success," said Dr. Moshe BenBassat, Chairman and CEO of ClickSoftware.  "We look forward to working closely with Thames Water to ensure they meet regulatory commitments, improve operational efficiency and customer satisfaction," he added.

ClickSoftware now operates in seven out of the twelve UK water and sewerage operators.

About ClickSoftware

ClickSoftware is the leading provider of automated workforce management and optimization solutions for every size of service business. Our portfolio of solutions, available on demand and on premises, create business value through higher levels of productivity, customer satisfaction and operational efficiency. Our patented concept of 'continuous planning and scheduling' incorporates customer demand forecasting, long and short term capacity planning, shift planning, real-time scheduling, mobility and location-based services, as well as on-going communication with the consumer on the expected arrival time of the service resource.

As the pioneers of the 'W6' concept more than 20 years ago, we have perfected solutions for solving a wide variety of problems on Who does What, for Whom, with What, Where and When. The combination of proven technology with educational services helps businesses find the right balance between reducing costs, increasing customer satisfaction, employee preferences and industry regulations/legislation. ClickSoftware's solutions manage over 250,000 resources in service businesses across a variety of industries and geographies. Our flexible deployment approach, breadth and depth of solutions and strong partnerships with leading CRM/ERP  vendors and system integrators makes us the number one choice to deliver superb business performance to any organization. The company is headquartered in the United States and Israel, with offices across Europe, and Asia Pacific. For more information, please visit www.clicksoftware.com. Follow us on Twitter.

Safe Harbour Statement

This press release contains express or implied forward-looking statements within the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and other U.S Federal securities laws. These forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, those statements regarding expected benefits to Thames Water and its customers from using ClickSoftware's ServiceOptimization Suite. Such "forward-looking statements" involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results or performance to differ materially from those projected, including those discussed in the "Risk Factors" section and elsewhere in ClickSoftware's annual report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2010 and in subsequent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Except as otherwise required by law, ClickSoftware is under no obligation to (and expressly disclaims any such obligation to) update or alter its forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

SOURCE ClickSoftware Technologies Ltd