TULSA, Okla., November 22, 2011 – Stonebridge, an award-winning information technology consulting firm, today announced that it continued to enjoy strong business growth through the third quarter, consistent with its overall performance to date this year.
Stonebridge’s total revenue for the first three quarters of 2011 increased by 38 percent compared to the same period last year, the result of new customer acquisition and contract extensions with existing clients. During the same period, the company also increased its overall average headcount by 32 percent.
Stonebridge Senior Vice President Matthew Childress said, “Our continued success is derived from one core factor: consistency. Whether it is in client relations, solution development, solution delivery, or sales and marketing, as a company we are consistently operating at a high level and pushing ourselves to increase the value we bring to our clients’ business.”
In the third quarter alone, revenues generated by the company’s Business Service Management (BSM) consulting group increased by 121 percent over the previous quarter, continuing the unit’s growth trend. The BSM group provides world-class consulting and technology implementation services incorporating the interdisciplinary fields of IT Business Management, IT Service Management and industry standards and methodologies such as ITIL, ISO/IEC, COBIT and CMMI.
Also in Q3, Stonebridge earned the Microsoft Gold Competency in Software Development. With this achievement, Stonebridge now holds four Microsoft Gold Competencies in the defined solution areas of Business Intelligence, Content Management, Portals and Collaboration, and Software Development. The company also owns three Microsoft Silver Competencies in Data Platform, Search and Web Development.
Stonebridge won significant new business contracts and project extensions in all of its practice areas during the third quarter. Key Q3 contract wins and client projects include:
- A natural gas producer engaged Stonebridge to create an information delivery framework for the company’s oilfield services subsidiary. The framework identifies key performance indicators that will be used to drive and monitor the business strategies and objectives of the organization. It also will guide the development of an enterprise data warehouse that will consolidate data from multiple disparate systems. The client selected Stonebridge based on its experience in the energy sector and in its expertise in creating information frameworks that enable business intelligence solutions to deliver the appropriate insight to organizational performance.
- A Fortune 500 natural gas company selected Stonebridge to develop a “spatial dashboard” proof of concept (POC) for improving data visualization and access. The POC streamlines field-level business processes involved in the company’s natural gas gathering and processing operations. The project involves four core components: Microsoft’s Bing Maps and SharePoint 2010 for data management, IDV Solution’s Visual Fusion for geospatial visualization and Adapx Capturx for digital pen technology. When complete, the POC will validate the integration between these technical components, as well as generate feedback from users as to the long-term viability and business value of these technologies. To date, the POC is getting rave reviews from business and field personnel.
- Stonebridge, in partnership with BMC Software, was engaged at one of the nation’s largest diversified health care benefits companies to develop configuration management processes and policies based on ITIL v3 and ISO/IEC 20000 standards. The client’s goal was to establish linkages between the IT department’s change management processes, built on BMC’s IT Service Management (ITSM) Remedy Suite’s Atrium Configuration Management Database (CMDB), and vital business functions and tools. Facilitating a series of interactive workshops and one-to-one sessions with key client-side stakeholders, Stonebridge developed a configuration management policy and process encompassing planning, identification, control, status accounting and reporting, and verification/validation. Also delivered in the project were definitions of IT roles and responsibilities, a RACI matrix chart, identification and documentation of key performance indicators (KPIs) and a training plan.
- A Fortune 500 power company selected Stonebridge to manage the database environments involved in a major data center migration and optimization project. The client is embarking on a large-scale migration of all of its IT systems to new data centers and disaster recovery sites. In addition to providing database migration services, Stonebridge will upgrade the client’s Oracle databases currently on Sun (approximately 15 databases) to IBM servers, getting all Oracle databases standardized on IBM servers. Included in the project are upgrades to more than 90 SQL Server and Oracle databases as well as database cleanup and decommissioning of more than 30 unused databases. Stonebridge had previously provided similar services to the client in an earlier data center migration initiative.
- A leading independent exploration and production company engaged Stonebridge to add new functionality to the client’s SharePoint 2010-based well data management system. Stonebridge will develop a number of key enhancements to the well data management system, which is integrated with the client’s risk management system. Central to the new functionality is an expanded search and reporting capability needed to monitor and manage well shut-ins, completions and workovers. The client cited Stonebridge’s extensive knowledge and expertise in the oil and gas industry and project experience with SharePoint customizations as key to the success of the project.
- Stonebridge, in collaboration with BMC Software, successfully architected and implemented a proof of concept (POC) involving key modules of BMC’s IT Business Management (ITBM) suite for one of Canada’s largest financial services institutions. The objective of the POC was to prove that BMC’s ITBM Demand Management and IT Service Cost Management modules would provide financial transparency of specific IT capabilities and for IT project alignment. Ultimately, the POC demonstrated that the BMC solution’s drill-down dashboard-based metrics would provide accurate financial insight into costs of projects and capabilities, assist in project and exception management, and produce a true “bill of IT” in the language of the business.
- Stonebridge completed a project to create an initial design template for a SharePoint-powered “best answers” knowledge management solution linking various user communities at an independent diversified energy company. The “best answers” initiative is a companywide approach for collecting, managing and sharing vital intellectual capital within and across functional business groups. The initial design template provided a standard layout that will serve as the foundation for collaboration by business groups, with each group managing its own “best answers” environment for its specific business function. Stonebridge created an initial mockup and functional design for the concept; revised and improved the design based on end-user feedback; constructed a rendition of the template in SharePoint; and created an initial layout structure for two client communities.
- Stonebridge completed a detailed assessment and strategic roadmap for an international oil and gas exploration and production company designed to enable compliance with new regulations for reporting inactive wells in its Texas operations. The new procedures, mandated by the Railroad Commission of Texas (RRS) governing body, require companies to monitor inactive wells and update RRS on a regular basis. The client currently uses a manual process for compliance. Stonebridge developed a framework including people, processes and technology for automating the inactive well reporting requirements.
- Stonebridge was selected to implement BMC’s IT Business Management (ITBM) suite for one of the nation’s largest banking institutions. Specifically, the client looked to the BMC Demand and Resource Management and Service Request Management solutions to facilitate IT demand and resource management services in order to improve overall IT project infrastructure-demand processes and cost transparency to the business. Additionally, the ITBM solution will establish a mechanism for forecast project infrastructure demand and minimize plan-to-actual variances by improving linkages and establishing a standard process for capturing the project information and tracking project financial and human resources.
- Stonebridge upgraded the SharePoint 2010 environment for a leading prime contractor for the commercial construction sector. Specifically, the upgrade provides enhanced collaboration and new social media features designed to improve productivity. In addition, Stonebridge enhanced the look and feel of the SharePoint graphical user interface to be user friendly and intuitive. The client chose Stonebridge based on its status as a Microsoft Gold Competency Partner and its specific expertise in SharePoint customizations.
- Stonebridge was engaged to develop a BMC-based solution for managing software licenses for a leading national bank. The objective of the project is to capture software application instances on the client’s approximately 65,000 servers and to validate the inventory against procured licenses in order to determine the client’s software license obligation. The required IT solution integrates ADDM 8.2 and the BMC IT Service Management (ITSM) Configuration Management Database (CMDB). Long term, the solution will enable normalization of software names in order to automatically match each software instance against a library of contracts. Additionally, the solution positions the client to leverage CMBD in other IT process areas, such as a consistent asset management process as defined in ITIL v3.
- Stonebridge facilitated a database upgrade from SQL Server 2005 to SQL Server 2008R2 for a market-leading online precious metals dealer. Stonebridge designed and implemented a redundant clustered server environment in support of the client’s critical e-commerce application in order to provide automatic failover. The Stonebridge solution is designed to eliminate any single points of failure that might result in a costly outage to the client’s production systems. The client chose Stonebridge because of its expertise in Microsoft database technologies and experience in configuring and administering databases for high-availability solutions.
- An independent oil and gas company engaged Stonebridge to provide SharePoint 2010 branding and customization in order to improve workflow and collaboration within the organization. As part of the project, Stonebridge also installed, configured and built out two business-critical workflows using the K2 blackpearl workflow engine. The client leveraged Stonebridge’s extensive SharePoint knowledge and experience with SharePoint-K2 integrations.
- Stonebridge provided an expanded deployment of the BMC IT Business Management (ITBM) Demand and Resource Management solution for a leading manufacturer of security software. Stonebridge originally implemented the ITBM Demand and Resource Management solution for client in October 2010. In the year since the implementation, the client’s business requirements required an extension of the ITBM solution across other business units. For the expanded deployment project, Stonebridge migrated the demand and resource management solution to three new environments: development, quality assurance and production. As a follow-on engagement, the client has requested that Stonebridge perform the upgrade to ITBM in the fourth quarter of 2011.
- An independent oil and gas company engaged Stonebridge to assess its existing SharePoint environment, make recommendations for long-term improvement and integrate Outlook calendars into My Sites host template. As part of the project, Stonebridge provided SharePoint branding and customization services to develop a custom master page for My Sites host template branded to align with the look and feel of the client’s public-facing website.
About Stonebridge
Stonebridge is an information technology consulting firm focused on helping organizations harness the power of their people, processes and technology. Our clients look to us as a strategic partner with a shared commitment to achieving their business objectives and maximizing their business performance. Founded in 1995 on a commitment to establishing high-value strategic alliances with our clients, Stonebridge has provided business solutions to organizations in all major industries, representing private, public, government, and non-profit entities. More info at www.sbconsulting.com.