ESRI Offers GIS Benefits to Small Utilities

05 January 2009, 10:13am

Redlands, California — January 5, 2008 — Small utilities will soon have greater access to geographic information system (GIS) technology as ESRI rolls out the Small Utilities Enterprise License Agreement (SU-ELA) program. For an affordable, fixed cost, the SU-ELA program provides IT, business, and supply-chain benefits to utilities in the United States with 100,000 customers or fewer. The program offers select unlimited deployments to desktop, server, Web, and mobile solutions of ESRI's ArcGIS platform; maintenance and support for products; staff training; passes to ESRI's International User Conference; and ESRI's data models.

At the heart of the SU-ELA program is ESRI's ArcGIS software, an open, scalable, and interoperable platform that provides a complete system to author, serve, and use geographic information. An enterprise GIS, based on ArcGIS technology, serves designers, analysts, decision makers, field staff, and customers.

To improve the small utility IT work processes, the SU-ELA program includes established maintenance and complete flexibility of ArcGIS deployment without the need to acquire additional licenses. Organizational workflows are simplified because ArcGIS technology complies with IT standards and uses off-the-shelf, commercial relational databases and standard data models.

The SU-ELA program offers built-in GIS training and support for enterprise GIS operations. ESRI's enterprise GIS is a mission-critical tool proven to support more than 70 different business functions of a utility extending from asset, vegetation, and outage management to inspection, maintenance, and as-built record keeping. Utility staff from multiple departments can quickly access information; share workflows; provide better customer service; and respond effectively to work orders, leaks, or outages.

The SU-ELA program simplifies the contract and budgeting process, saving utilities time and money. Procurement costs are reduced because the agreements require only one payment per year for the three-year term. Administrative costs shrink as a result of centralized coordination and management of software distribution, support, services, and training.

"While small utilities sustain themselves on limited budgets and personnel, they are still expected to provide the same level of operations management and customer service as their larger counterparts," says Bill Meehan, ESRI's director of utility solutions. "To effectively and efficiently meet challenges, utilities rely on enterprise GIS. ESRI's SU-ELA program makes enterprise GIS easy for small utilities to acquire."

ESRI's SU-ELA program

Geo: International