Customers

How Multiview Financial Software Went SaaS in 72 hrs

Multiview is a leading provider of accounting and financial software. For more than 3 decades, Multiview has been providing powerful, sophisticated, yet easy-to-use financial applications to customers. Its diverse customer base has ranged from small regional hospitals to large multinational enterprises such as ExxonMobil, Shell, Macy’s, and USAA.Like thousands of other business management software vendors, Multiview’s Windows desktop application relies on a central database to store and retrieve data. Clients love Multiview’s intuitive and rich user interface and sophisticated reporting, and appreciate the efficiency it provides — for everything from inventory to payroll.

Need for a cloud-based offering

Buoyed by the rise of cloud computing and the improved functionality of mobile devices and tablets in recent years, many Multiview clients began requesting a cloud-based offering. As Multiview began researching potential options for remote delivery of its software, the company’s main concern revolved around maintaining the smooth functionality and rich user interface that sets it apart from its competition.

Despite the challenges of building a cloud-based solution, Multiview knew that developing a software-as-a-service (SaaS) alternative to its established product was vital to maintaining its client base — and winning new business. This is especially true since SaaS requires zero IT involvement for deployment and upgrades, and no datacenter to manage.

Xi Frame as a solution

During their transitional period, Multiview read about Xi Frame in a Forbes article, then reached out to learn more. They soon discovered that Nutanix empowers any desktop application to run in the cloud, making it easily accessible via a web browser.

The Xi Frame platform has been brilliantly designed for software vendors who want to deliver the same familiar Windows applications to customers — through a web browser, on any device. This smart, smooth functionality ensures that the same graphics-rich user interface consumers have come to expect can be used on any device, on any location. It soon became clear to Multiview that a partnership with Nutanix would allow them to simply “lift and shift” their application to deliver their software, as is, in the cloud — with no internal R&D required and no compromises for end users.

MULTIVIEW HAS ALREADY DEPLOYED FRAME to reach a variety of customers. These customers have ranged from small regional hospitals, lacking the resources for a dedicated IT staff and infrastructure, to large corporations, seeking greater flexibility for their employees. Previously, Multiview only deployed on-premises. This required their customers to invest in and maintain a local server and associated hardware. It also meant they must employ IT staff to manage data backup and storage disaster recovery strategies.

Now, Multiview simply sets up a secure, virtual private cloud (VPC) for each customer, and end users can access Multiview through the web — on any device, with extremely low latency. Multiview and Xi Frame handle all IT management, administration, security, backup, and disaster recovery. The SaaS model also enables a simple pay-as-you-go billing structure that includes support and licensing (and there’s no expensive hardware to purchase).

You can calculate the cost of the servers and the IT staff salary and all that, but ultimately, it’s hard to put a number on the savings that Xi Frame provides. It’s not only the cost that’s saved, but also the time and the headaches. All the infrastructure and management concerns are eliminated. And the security is actually better with Frame, because they have the backing of top-notch cloud providers, like Amazon Web Services: there are far fewer people who have access to the VPC than before, with the on-premises server.

Jamil El Ghazal, Multiview Manager of Technology Services

The customer impact

Multiview customer Mile Hi Specialty Foods provides distribution, warehousing, and local delivery services to more than 1,000 restaurants. Employees across the Mile Hi management team and financial department rely on Multiview for their accounting services. Having a limited in-house IT staff, Mile Hi opted to switch to Multiview’s SaaS model in order to streamline IT management and allow employees to work remotely. End users at Mile Hi experienced immediate benefits after transitioning to Multiview’s SaaS model via Nutanix — including increased speed and flexibility and IT automation.

The main benefit for me is the accessibility, the fact that I can work at home and accomplish the same tasks. We’re based in Denver, and we get a lot of snow, but now that I can use Multiview remotely, I don’t need to worry about falling behind when I’m stuck at home. As soon as we started using Multiview in the cloud, we immediately noticed that access to financial data was significantly faster.

Julie Mensik, Mile Hi Manager of Business Integration

The many benefits of choosing Xi Frame

By partnering with Nutanix to move Multiview into the cloud, everyone benefits. Money, time, resources, and concerns are all saved. And Multiview employees and clients alike were thrilled with improvements in overall performance and speed. It’s clearly a win-win — for all the parties involved.

“Re-writing our software for the cloud would have taken several years,” says Thomson. “We also would have had to simplify the visual experience and ultimately offer two different products to our customers. By harnessing Xi Frame to move to the cloud, we were up and running in days — with a single application available for customers who want to run on-prem or in the cloud.”