Callahan & Associates
Leading national credit unions consulting company
Callahan & Associates, Inc. based at WashingtonDC, USA is a national credit union research and consulting firm that specializes in financial publications, analysis software, strategic planning and investment management. Callahan has been at the leading edge of credit union issues for over 20 years. They provide credit union professionals with the tools and insights into best practices to do their jobs effortlessly.
Callahan had prominent, highly graphical financial analysis desktop software, Peer-to-Peer 1.0, which was one of the many offerings to its clients, i.e., Credit Union banks in USA. This version of software was developed in-house over a period spanning about more than a decade. Callahan wanted to develop a new version of the software using new technology viz. 3 Tier architecture and enhance the functionality to not only retain the existing user-base, but to increase the market share.
Peer to Peer 2.0
Business Challenge: A new version of stable application with intuitive user interface and GUI Callahan embarked upon the most ambitious makeover of Peer-to-Peer software. The 4 primary objectives were:
- While retaining current analytical capabilities, add new functionality and provide growth path,
- Provide a more intuitive user interface for new as well as power users
- Embrace new technologies and standards for easy maintainability of product by internal IT team
- Retain the existing user-base while expanding the market share
The end goal was to have a new version of the product that shall capture potential customer's attention and elicit 'WOW' from existing ones. The new product needed to shed the image of 'slow', 'MS-DOS' based, 'often crashes', 'difficult interface' associated with the earlier version. A complete makeover from the earlier version with consistent new look, capabilities and features was of utmost importance.
In new version there is no concept of 'peer' or 'primary'. It simply allows users to select any number(s) of credit unions, either singly or in merged groups, and do 1-to-1, 1-to-many or many-to-many comparisons.
Secondly, Peer 2.0 will incorporate econometric data (GDP, Inflation, Unemployment etc) allowing users to simply analyze their own credit union performance against broader economy.
Finally, Peer 2.0 needed automations like display of subscription renewal notices, automatic display of new updates ready for download, ability for credit unions to upload their corporate logo in the graph etc.
Choosing the Right Vendor
Callahan invited bids from couple of vendors and evaluated them. The quest for a dependable vendor that understood Callahan's business drivers and needs for re-engineering of Peer-to-Peer 1.0 led them to select VBSOFT. It was VBSOFT's understanding of Callahan's requirements, their ability to devise and propose an appropriate solution and their track record of delivering quality product on time led to their selection as a partner.
Results Meet Callahan's Expectation
The results were absolutely in line with Callahan's expectations. Not only did VBSOFT develop and delivered Peer 2.0 on time, they exceeded Callahan's expectations. All along the project, VBSOFT coordinated and maintained a very healthy communication with Callahan team? "Their regular and consistent progress reporting kept Callahan team aware of the progress at each stage. VBSOFT provided valuable inputs on functional as well as technological areas keeping the product path in mind. They were always ready to walk extra mile to meet our expectations. The end result is an excellent product that far exceeds Callahan's expectations".
