Interviews with Software Manufacturers: Information from Every Angle
RER interviews Helen Sowerby, chief operating officer of Rentalresult, about the company’s software including its Mobile Suite, data protection, integration with telematics and more.
RER: Is strengthening the mobile functionality an important current emphasis? What are your company’s capabilities and strengths in that area?
Sowerby: Result continues to add new Mobile Apps to our Mobile Suite every couple of months, this has been an important emphasis for the last 18 months enabling our customers to extend their rental business into the field and deliver real-time processing across every aspect of their business.
All Result mobile apps are developed in native iOS and Android delivering secure, real-time processing from the rental yard (picking, inventory counts etc.) to the field (delivery and pickup signature capture, load confirmation by trucking companies, field servicing etc.).
Result’s latest mobile app allows construction job sites to receive re-rented assets themselves rather than having paperwork generated in back-office transactions.
What are some of the advancements your customers are calling for that you’re working on?
We just released our latest module: Labor scheduling and allocation, allowing specialist rental companies to manage labor scheduling and deployment of specialist technicians to meet the requirements of not just their field service activities but also their rental contracts. This specialist module allows the rental company to manage not only the charges for rental equipment, but also timesheet-based charges, or simply to track timesheet hours against a rental for costing purposes.
What about payment by smartphone, how is that capability progressing?
None of our current customer base has shown any interest in payments by smartphone, should they do so then we already have web service integration to allow remote payments which can easily be turned into a smartphone option.
Are customers concerned about the safety of their data, protection against hacking or other invasions of privacy and information theft? What is your company doing to protect your customers?
Security is not something that we take lightly. This is why our entire rentalresult architecture is based on best of breed security protocols utilizing the Java Spring Security framework. Every additional application Result adds to the rentalresult platform adopts the same security protocols making it possible to control access not just from the core applications, but also from mobile apps and our e-commerce and job site portals.
Result SaaS customers are deployed on the Amazon AWS platform ensuring that they can take advantage of Amazon’s huge investments in security and data storage and ensuring that their data stays safe and secure.
How important is it to be able to integrate with other types of software, for example, integration with SmartEquip and other software-related service providers?
In order to provide easy integration options to any type of application, Result developed a full SOA platform five years ago and continues to extend and strengthen this platform every year ensuring that integration is simple and quick. We have customers all over the world looking for integration to everything from RFID readers to GPS tracking, online Credit Card Processing gateways to corporate systems. The Result SOA platform is an incredibly important part of our architecture and often is a significant contributory factor to customer selection.
How can your software help a rental company better analyze its cost structure and determine which equipment is profitable and which isn’t? How can your software help a rental company determine at what point a piece of equipment becomes unprofitable and should be sold?
As mobile apps, customer and job site portals and integrated applications make it easier to capture every detail of equipment usage and costs, it is essential that your rental system can store and utilize this information to feed into your equipment ROI and profitability models. The days of simply using a rental system for generating invoices are long gone and for most of our customers it is the ability to capture information from every angle that drives their understanding of their equipment profitability.
How about fleet inspections and diagnostics/interface with telematics systems, what is your functionality in this arena?
Result has several customers utilizing complex telematics data to drive not just their fleet inspections but also their customer billing processes. Acme Lift for example uses integrated telematics data to drive their business through rentalresult. The rentalresult system is incredibly flexible allowing you to define what types of sensors and readings you are holding, and to utilize the data within your business processes.
