Invantive mostly aims for financial service providers, manufacturing and real estate companies. ‘It is especially important in these sectors that complex business processes and financial flows are made transparent, are tuned to each other and that there the situation is continuously monitored. IT is indispensable here. Companies grow and accumulate more and more systems through the years. An RP system Enterprise Resource Planning) or a combination of several systems, like MIS (Management Information System) and a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. But the systems should grow along with the enterprise. They need to be able to keep on communicating with each other. Otherwise everything will run independently of each other after a certain amount of time, which can have a lot of bad consequences. The lead time will become too lengthy, the information will be incomplete or only available to the management after long sessions and complicated reports. These are all problems that can be solved by us.’
'The last few years Ballast Nedam Ontwikkelingsmaatschappij has been growing rapidly,’ explains Daniël Wabeke, who has been working for years for Ballast Nedam. ‘There is not just a growth in numbers, but also of time frames (more projects are long-term) and complexity. In an increasing number of people are involved longer and longer with a project. Within Ballast Nedam Ontwikkeling that has resulted in a need to professionalize.’
Need for an efficient management tool
‘A real estate project is, besides consisting of a sophisticated urban development plan, a beautiful architectural design and the right supply/demand ratio, also about the bundling of the multiple information flows. Ballast Nedam Ontwikkelingsmaatschappij used to record all this data mainly through Excel and Word. Yet because of the previously described developments and the resulting process of professionalizing, the need for a more transparent management tool emerged. That is how contact with the Invantive company came into existence,’ says Pepijn Nijhuis, who has worked for over three years as a controller for Ballast Nedam Nieuwegein, and prior to that worked for the English daughter company of the same organization. Wabeke: ‘What is particularly interesting about the Invantive Estate package is that you can trace the entire life cycle of the project in all its phases as well as throughout all the years. In addition, Invantive Estate does not just manage information flows, but it also offers an up-to-date financial insight into real estate development projects which allows for a more efficient control on budgets. Another major advantage is that the product is transparent - and with that I mean a transparency towards the underlying systems and information sources. Invantive Estate is able to generate a kind of helicopter view across all sources.’
Direct intervention
Invantive Estate is linked to the financial system, but it also provides insight into document management,’ Nijhuis adds. ‘All (financial) information flows become transparent and easily accessible. That saves a huge amount of time and annoyance. As a controller, I no longer need to spend weeks to figure out all the details. The control of projects by the management and the insight into business processes are also improved. That is how it is now easy to continually monitor all projects and to immediately seize control if it seems necessary!’
Publication from Nederland in Ontwikkeling 2008