Intuit Inc. (Nasdaq: INTU) today announced new applications for QuickBase®, its Web-based information management solution, that will enable IT professionals and technology support teams to effectively manage their project portfolio, easily track incoming requests, and efficiently share their knowledge. A powerful yet affordable alternative to high-end database and spreadsheet solutions, QuickBase ready-to-launch IT applications, can dramatically reduce launch time of services that are essential in everyday IT operations. Additionally, because QuickBase is a Web-hosted solution, it requires little maintenance and support thereby minimizing total cost of ownership (TCO) of these IT applications for corporate workgroups and small businesses.
In conjunction with the release of ready-to-launch IT applications, Intuit is also announcing new functionality that extend the flexibility and ease-of-use of QuickBase.
"From the time we announced our first ready-to-launch applications, IT professionals have praised QuickBase for providing workgroup applications that addresses customer requirements - quick to deploy, drop dead easy to learn and customize, and requiring minimal support and maintenance," said Jana Eggers, general manager of QuickBase. "With the new ready-to-launch IT applications we are extending the value of QuickBase for IT professionals by providing them with applications specifically designed around their business processes and communications needs."
Customer Driven Innovation Leads To QuickBase IT Applications
The new IT applications were developed utilizing Intuit's Customer Driven Innovation (CDI) techniques. Recognizing that 50 percent of QuickBase users were choosing the ready-to-launch applications rather than building them from scratch, Intuit conducted research with current customers and prospects in IT-related fields. As an example, one project sought to understand how they evaluate the myriad of projects they manage and set priorities. Intuit learned that the most important issue for IT professionals was the ability to see projects in a simple "at-a-glance" list and, from this view, easily change sort priorities, drill down on projects, and analyze risk. The new QuickBase applications account for these requirements and address specific IT business processes including:
- Project Portfolio Manager enables senior-level IT managers to track requests for major projects, and prioritize them by risk, cost and business impact, eliminating guesswork about team projects and allowing managers to instantly give updates to executives.
- Request Manager tracks and triages incoming requests from internal clients, creating a customized process to monitor, solve and close out IT requests.
- Knowledge Base provides a shared repository of common technical issues and solutions, giving team members access to the most up-to-date information that can help them be more effective in their job.
In addition to the new IT applications, QuickBase includes an extensive library of ready-to-launch applications that address a wide range of business processes including marketing, sales force automation (SFA), project management, human resources, back-office and customer relationship management (CRM).
"Our success is rooted in the quality and level of service we provide to each and every one of our customers, and as we experience tremendous growth, we are committed to maintaining our best practices," said Stewart Marcano, CTO of Accu Bite Dental Supply, a nationally recognized distributor of dental supplies and equipment to dental practices. "QuickBase serves as the hub for information and collaboration amongst teams, so we are able to streamline business processes and ensure that good "customer service" practices are adopted across our growing operations. Because of the flexible and customizable nature of QuickBase's ready-to-launch applications, which can be adopted and deployed in a matter of days versus months required by other software packages, we gain competitive advantage by responding immediately to our customers' needs."
Enhancements to Core QuickBase Platform
Addressing the overall ease-of-use, Intuit has added automated application creation from imported spreadsheets and ability to do "on the fly" customization features to QuickBase. Also the new release includes date dependency, snapshot summary fields, color-coded information tagging, and project import from Microsoft Project.
Pricing and Availability
QuickBase and the ready-to-launch IT applications are available immediately at http://quickbase.intuit.com. Intuit offers a free, full-featured 30-day trial. A monthly subscription fee is $249, which includes access for 10 simultaneous users per application. Additional users and data storage are available for additional fees.
