	"We narrowed it down to four, but none of them could do what Project Insight did for the price." - National Project Manager, Agfa Global Services

SUCCESS STORY - Agfa Newspaper Division

"Initially we looked at over 200 packages, narrowed that down to 17, then did beta tests on four packages. Ultimately, none of them could do anything like what Project Insight could do for the price."
--J. B., National Project Manager

Afga The Company
Belgium-based Agfa develops, manufactures and distributes analogue and digital products and systems for the making, processing and reproduction of images for healthcare, the printing and photo industry, and many other areas such as micrography and motion pictures. Although Agfa generates 95% of its revenue in the business-to-business markets, the company contributes to the everyday lives of millions of people worldwide. Whenever you read a newspaper, visit a hospital or look at your favorite holiday pictures, Agfa has probably been closely involved.

The Challenge
It is challenging enough working to the standards of an employer like global imaging leader Agfa, but when your customers are also leaders like the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times, the pressure to work smarter and meet deadlines is all the greater.

Agfa's Newspaper Division works with nearly every major newspaper in North America, assisting its pre-press operations through a combination of hardware and software. National Project Manager, J. B. said, "These newspapers are tough customers, and they have to be, because if they miss a daily deadline it means hundreds of thousands of dollars in losses. They expect quality and speed of service, and there's simply no such thing as downtime."

J. B. began searching for a solution when it became clear that Agfa's Newspaper Division, which used Lotus Notes and Microsoft Project, among other tools, required a better means of communicating and collaborating on plan-development with customers, field service engineers, and project managers, all of whom worked at different geographic locations.

The Agfa Newspaper Division has remote workers all over the world. Notes J. B., "Agfa's based in Belgium. I'm based in Massachusetts. Offsite representatives of the company need access from wherever they happen to be standing. None of the national project managers had a good method for getting the 'big picture.' We work within a very tight virtual private network, and it would be a chore to tell an engineer in the field to log into the VPN and then to ask them, 'Would you mind opening up your firewall in order to view this calendar?'"

The Solution
J. B. and his team began searching for a web-based solution. He described Agfa's exhaustive search by saying, "Initially we looked at over 200 packages, narrowed that down to 17, then did beta tests on four packages. Ultimately, none of them could do anything like what Project Insight could do for the price."

Citing Project Insight's ease of installation and training, Barker noted that, "I can train a field service engineer on Project Insight within an hour with a WebEx seminar and a follow-up video training. Project Insight gives us all the tools any project manager needs to handle small- to mid-level projects. I once trained a customer on the system in ten minutes."

The Results
Project Insight has made it possible for the entire national project management group, Agfa's managers at customer sites, and hundreds of field service engineers deployed in various sites in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, to stay up-to-date with project status and to communicate in real-time.

J. B. noted, "Recently a customer asked whether there was room underneath a particular piece of our equipment for a drain. I took photos of the area under the equipment, sent a link to the photo to show what I was recommending, and the problem was solved. I didn't have to set up an account for him or go to any extra trouble. I've had a few customers who said, "'If you designed this system, you deserve a raise.'"

Whether a company is already using a system like Microsoft Project or not, Agfa's Newspaper Division thinks it's living proof that Project Insight is a superior method of sharing and delivering information for more efficient project management.