Carnegie Mellon's SEI Praises Salion's Business and Software Development Processes

AUSTIN, Texas and DETROIT, March 17 -- One of the nation's leading software research and development organizations -- the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) of Carnegie Mellon -- has singled out Salion, Inc. for its industry-leading best practices in enterprise software development and business processes that combine to create business value to both the company and its customers.

SEI is a federally-funded research and development center sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense and operated by Carnegie Mellon University. The SEI's mission is to provide leadership in advancing best practices in software engineering to improve the quality of systems that depend on software "because delivering the right software to end users is fundamental to success."

In a recently released case study of Salion's business and product development models, the SEI notes that Salion has developed an approach where "the business and technical sides of the house work together seamlessly."

This approach has produced a business culture that fosters enthusiasm, process discipline and continuous product improvement. The approach has also resulted in the creation of a set of robust, web-based scalable software solutions that have a unique "product line architecture" that yields exceptional performance and business value to customers.

Salion specializes in Revenue Acquisition Management (RAM) Solutions that help B2B engineering-oriented companies such as automotive suppliers organize and manage their disparate selling and quoting activities as one coordinated business process.

"Salion has evolved its most effective blend of practices for software product lines with a true continuous improvement mentality. In short, everyone at Salion is on the same page," says the report.

Effective Models and Processes

On the technical side, simplicity, run-time efficiency, scalability and quality are the cornerstones of Salion's software architecture. On the business side, Salion's obsession with communication from top to bottom of the organization and everyone sticking to "the plan" has results in a singular approach to moving the company forward.

The study notes that the company's design philosophy "reflects their deliberative commitment to simplicity, but not at the expense of quality" while an appreciation of the product scope is ingrained in the marketing and executive staff so the company remains focused on its well-defined product line.

"Seamless 24/7 operation is a requirement, as is the unconditional preservation of a customer's data confidentiality; security and availability lead the list of required attributes," says the report. Further, it notes that "Salion never loses sight of the fact that it is producing a single product line with a small number of variations" all of which contribute to its success.

The basic architecture provides for three tiers: a front-end tier, a core platform in the middle, and a database on the bottom. Each customer gets a dedicated pair of front-end servers with a unique URL for access. This provides high availability and prevents security breaches. Customized software runs only on the front-end servers; the other platforms run common software.

"This system architecture, and the way software is allocated to it, makes upgrades and customizations straightforward. It allows for simple customizations for small upgrades, and if more significant upgrades are needed, Salion can scale up that area without affecting any other part of the architecture or any other customer."

Product Definition

Further adding to the system's efficiency is Salion's product line strategy that mimics the automakers'. Just as an entry-level four-door automobile provides adequate transportation for some customers, others may want to configure theirs with sporty trim and loaded with options. But it's still the same vehicle platform.

Salion's revenue acquisition software suite contains three major product groups: Revenue Process Manager, Knowledge Manager and Business Link, and each of those have unique products or "options" as well. Each product is represented as a package of functionality that provides extensions or modules that can be turned on or off, depending on the subscription level of each customer, notes the report.

This contributes to the relatively quick implementation, a low cost-to- functionality ratio, and allows customers to use the product without having to pay for high-cost product customization to make the solution is useable.

It is also appealing technically, says the study, because it is simpler: every customer is shipped the same system. Building, installation, maintenance, and upgrades are vastly simplified which appeals to Salion's CFO and CIO as much as it benefits Salion's customers.

The SEI's study, titled "Salion, Inc.: A Software Product Line Case Study" focused on Salion because "it is unusual to find start-up companies using such a sophisticated product development process: especially one that has used the process since inception and has experienced significant success as a result.

"How Salion achieved success with this model, evolved its scope, became more concrete over time, skillfully managed an innovated process model, and gathered fundamental insights about customization versus configuration are all parts of Salion's unique story."

SEI concludes that the company's business and product models bode well for the future. According to the SEI, Salion is poised to grow. Salion's organization, process, and architecture "provide it with vast untapped capacity. The untapped capacity is not only beneficial for Salion as they secure more customers but also as they seek more investors."

The study can be found at http://www.sei.cmu.edu/publications/documents/02.reports/02tr038.html .

About Salion

Salion, Inc., with offices in Austin, Texas and Detroit, Michigan, is the first enterprise software company to provide Revenue Acquisition Management (RAM) Solutions(TM) tailored to the unique needs of automotive suppliers. Salion's RAM Solutions allow suppliers to organize and manage their disparate selling and quoting activities as one coordinated business process, resulting in higher revenues, margins, and customer satisfaction. For more information, visit www.salion.com or email info@salion.com .

Salion, Salion Revenue Acquisition Management (RAM) Solutions, Salion Revenue Process Manager, Salion Knowledge Manager, and Salion Business Link are trademarks of Salion, Inc. All other company or product names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

About SEI

The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) is a U.S. Department of Defense federally funded research and development center operated by Carnegie Mellon University. The SEI helps organizations make measured improvements in their software engineering capabilities by providing technical leadership to advance the practice of software engineering. For more information, visit the SEI Web site at www.sei.cmu.edu .