UCS Software Manufacturing, well positioned as a global retail software ‘factory’, has become the first software company in Africa – and the first retail software company globally – to gain international software development best-practice accreditation. UCS Software Manufacturing (UCSSM), the ‘software factory’ within the JSE Securities Exchange listed UCS Group Limited – is spearheading the group’s drive to increasingly sell world-leading retail software manufacturing services globally.

On the 29th September UCSSM was registered with the Software Engineering Institute in the USA as a CMMI SE/SW Level-3 Certified software company. CMMI is the Best Practice barometer for the software world. The process took 16 months to complete and UCSSM was assessed by KPMG International, reports Neels van Tonder, CEO of UCSSM.

“This coveted certification level - which has only been attained by 144 companies globally – allows us to ensure high reliability and predictability in delivering world-class mission critical retail software to our customers. It will give companies around the globe the confidence to outsource software manufacturing services to us and this certification – which is totally unbiased – has undoubtedly positioned us among the best-in-class software providers from an international perspective.”

UCSSM provides complete software design, engineering and manufacturing services that are vertically integrated with component capabilities to optimise its OEM customers’ time-to- market, and overall operations. The company boasts two decades of software development experience within a wide range of retail sectors, including clothing, DIY, forecourt, convenience stores, quick service, sit-down restaurants, pharmacies and furniture retail companies.

The company, said van Tonder, helps retail-focused customers design, build, ship and maintain software products through a network of facilities across EMEA and via offices in India. “Our multi-national presence – and our backing from UCS Group – allows us to provide customers with complete design, engineering and manufacturing resources that are vertically integrated with various components to optimise their operations by lowering their development costs and reducing their time-to-market.”

Heading up the KPMG Software Process Improvement (SPI) team was Gian Rastogi, who has conducted 40 software company assessments globally, of which the last twenty five have been on cutting-edge CMMI implementations. In UCSSM, said Rastogi, “We were particularly impressed with the software engineering excellence and a culture reflecting a will and dedication to make things work.”

Commenting further, Van Tonder said: “This certification is not just another piece of paper. It gives us the pedigree to move into the global market with confidence and to expand our OEM client footprint rapidly. We now have the certified software engineering capability and as a result of our history and locale, comparatively favorable software production economies of scale and scope – they have been proven locally at some of the largest retail organisations – and now we are well-placed to extend this aboard.”

UCS Group Limited has been consolidating the R&D of retail facing software businesses within the group into a single operating entity during the last 12 months and the successful achievement of this process is expected to impact noticeably on software production efficiencies within the next 24 months,” said van Tonder.

With a turnover of R486 million for the year ended 30 September 2004, UCS Group Limited is the JSE-listed investment holding company of a set of information technology businesses that provide world-class application software solutions, business consultancy and outsourcing services in their chosen markets, most significantly in the retail, manufacture and wholesale sectors.

Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) is a process improvement approach that provides organisations with the essential elements of effective processes. It is used to guide process improvement within an organisation. CMMI helps integrate traditionally separate organisational functions, set process improvement goals and priorities, provide guidance for quality processes, and provide a point of reference for appraising current processes based on the communal experiences of a large number of international software companies.

Issued on behalf of:
UCS Software Manufacturing
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