Elan Public Transport is an independent consultancy providing research, transport planning, and IT solutions for large-scale transport agencies throughout the UK and the Middle East, all of whom choose Elan because it delivers innovative, leading-edge, “green” solutions. Elan is a small company serving organizations with over a thousand employees, which makes it imperative to look for ways to leverage IT to match the efficiency of its customers. “We live and breathe innovation, efficiency, and a green mentality,” says John Henshall, Senior Transport Analyst at Elan. “That is why transport agencies choose us.” In 2009, the company saw an opportunity to increase its own business efficiency while reducing its carbon footprint with the Windows® 7 Professional operating system. It was a decision that paid off in business value.
Situation
Since Elan’s services are designed to improve productivity, efficiency, and profitability for its clients, it is very important that the company operates at the highest levels in each of these categories. “We may be a small firm, but that doesn’t matter to our clients. If we don’t operate at the highest levels of efficiency, how can we expect our clients to trust that our solutions will improve their efficiency and profitability?” says Henshall.
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With Windows 7 systems are up and running in seconds. It’s fantastic time saving! |
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John Henshall, Senior Transport Analyst, Elan Public Transport Consultancy |
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In 2009, Elan began researching solutions that would improve its business efficiency and productivity, while staying true to its own core philosophy of reducing its carbon footprint. According to Henshall, it found the solution it needed with Windows 7.
Solution
Elan Public Transport deployed Windows 7 to its computers, and saw results immediately. Since Windows 7 is a faster, more intuitive and more flexible operating system, users spend less time waiting for systems to respond and more time working on vital business tasks, whether on the road or in the office.
“[Windows 7 offers] a smaller OS footprint; an improved user interface that should allow for faster boot-up and shut-down times; improved power management for enhanced battery life; enhanced media capabilities; and increased reliability, stability and security,” says Brad Brooks, Corporate Vice President, Windows Consumer Product Marketing.
Windows 7 helps increase business efficiency by speeding up access to information. Systems start-up and resume faster, significantly reducing costly downtime, while productivity enhancements speed up everyday tasks associated with business processes, and enable users to access files, folders, and applications in seconds.
Windows 7 also comes with improved mobile connectivity features that enable users to find new networks and printers instantly. It even allows users to control all mobility settings from a single location – a significant advantage for Elan’s workers when they are on the go. Improved power and resource management, help reduce power consumption, making it a perfect for the Elan’s “green” focus.
Benefits
Speeding up Access
System speed was a particular pain point for Elan, because employees were experiencing waits of five minutes or more during boot up, shut down, and resume from standby. Windows 7 helps make PCs faster, more reliable, and more responsive.
Windows 7 sFaster focuses on the basics that can impact the speed of the system, so systems start up, shut down, resume, and respond faster. “With previous operating systems, our employees often waited five minutes each time they booted up or shut down. That added to 15-20 minutes of downtime every day,” says Henshall. “With Windows 7 systems are up and running in seconds. It’s fantastic time saving!”
Improving Productivity
Windows 7 makes businesses more efficient by helping make employees more productive. New Aero® desktop personalization simplifies everyday tasks so employees can spend more time on their core business. Aero “Snap” enables users to place windows side-by-side for simultaneous viewing. “Shake” lets users shake background windows to make them disappear, and “Peek” makes windows transparent so users can easily see what’s on the desktop. Taskbar personalization enables users to take advantage of Jump Lists to see which files and applications they’ve used recently by simply clicking on the taskbar icons.
Windows 7 Desktop Search makes finding important files, folders, and applications easier and faster. With Instant Search, users find what they’re looking for in seconds by typing in a search phrase. The search engine scours the entire PC, network, and even the Internet to locate the right file or application. “In our business, we often need to locate information such as research findings or transport planning models from a year or two back,” says Henshall. “That can be a time-consuming task to do manually. With Search, we have the information in an instant. It saves us at least an hour each week in productive time.”
Staying Mobile, Going Green
Windows 7 also comes with improved mobility features that enable users to work more intuitively and seamlessly between office, home, and the mobile world by providing instant access to the right networks and printers, and by enabling longer battery life on the road while reducing power consumption in the office.
Windows 7 Power Management features, such as adaptive display brightness, which dims the display if the system has been on for a while, extends battery life, while Mobility Center gives user a single location to control all mobility settings such as presentation settings, and settings to extend the desktop to mobile devices.
“The new mobility and resource management functions are enabling us to work more efficiently while conserving power,” says Henshall. “That’s good for profitability, and very good for our carbon footprint.”
Gaining a Competitive Edge
Windows 7 is freeing up time and resources that Elan can use to better serve its clients. Idle time has been reduced and employee productivity enhanced – all while reducing power consumption. According to Henshall, Elan’s customers expect efficiency and a small footprint from it – that’s why they choose Elan for their transportation consultancy needs.
What may be the biggest benefit of Windows 7 is that it enables Elan to look like a big company, while preserving the agility and responsiveness of a small company. “The efficiency improvements we’ve realized due to Windows 7 have been incredible. Windows 7 also gives us the speed and functionality of a large company, without the overhead. We can remain small, while responding even faster to our customers. That gives us competitive advantage over other bigger, slower firms.”
Windows 7
Faster and more reliable: Windows 7 will help your organization use information technology to gain a competitive advantage in today’s new world of work. Your people will be able to be more productive anyway. You will be able to support your mobile work force with better access to shared data and collaboration tools. And your IT staff will have better tools and technologies to enhance corporate IT security, data protection, and more efficient deployment and management.
For more information about Windows 7, go to:
www.microsoft.com/windows/business
For More Information
For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234 in the United States or (905) 568-9641 in Canada. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:
www.microsoft.com
For more information about Peak Support Services products and services, call 01629 582128 or visit the Web site at:
www.peaksupport.co.uk
For more information about Elan Public Transport products and services, call +44 (0)845 123 57 33 or visit the Web site at:
www.elanptc.com
