Yesterday we had a guest post on the topic.
Today you might read the I, Cringley take, which as can be expected is full of his usual cobbled-together, but pretty effective, roll-your-own solutions.
CareCloud, a provider of web-based practice management, electronic healthcare record (EHR), revenue cycle management and medical billing software and services, today announced that it has partnered with Lone Star MSO, a practice management services organization in Texas, to offer CareCloud’s cloud-based software and services to medical practice clients. Lone Star MSO currently services hundreds of medical group clients throughout Texas and multiple other states and will look to further assist them in optimizing financial and clinical outcomes through CareCloud’s platform and services.
“We are extremely excited to partner with CareCloud and offer their cloud-based software and services to our clients across Texas and the nation during a time when medical groups of all sizes are requiring more flexible and cost effective ways to streamline their administrative operations and the patient care they deliver,” said Trey W. Schroeder, Managing Director of Lone Star MSO. “We have always looked to bring the industry’s leading web-based practice management technologies to our clients. It has become clear that CareCloud’s practice management and EHR offerings stand out from others in the industry and will be a tremendous help to administrators and caregivers as they navigate an increasingly complex healthcare regulatory environment while delivering the best care possible.”
Under the terms of the agreement, Lone Star MSO will be a value-added reseller of CareCloud’s full suite of cloud-based physician practice management products at pre-negotiated pricing to Lone Star MSO clients. CareCloud currently offers medical groups its Meaningful Use certified electronic health record solution, CareCloud Charts, which is fully integrated with the Company’s practice management offering, CareCloud Central. Additionally, Lone Star MSO customers will be able to leverage CareCloud Concierge, a complete revenue cycle management solution that utilizes dynamic rules intelligence software, expert live support and real time business analytics and reporting tools to help medical practices increase collections and streamline operations.
“Lone Star MSO continues to stand apart in its ability to bring innovative services and technology to physicians across Texas and the nation. By partnering with CareCloud, Lone Star MSO will help its clients grow their practices and deliver the best patient care possible,” said Albert Santalo, Chairman and CEO of CareCloud. “We are thrilled to team with Lone Star MSO and its management team as we look to expand the nationwide presence of our cloud-based platform to help physicians take advantage of new government incentive programs and navigate emerging payer reimbursement methodologies.”
Even experienced project managers get stuck occasionally. Perhaps, they need a memory jog regarding a concept they learned in training last year. Or advice on a PM scenario they’ve never faced before. Systemation’s new e-tool, Ask My PM Coach, provides quick responses on over 1,000 project management topics, via computer or mobile device, 24/7.
“This is a new type of on-the-job aid for the project management community,” says Ben Snyder, Systemation’s CEO. “When under a deadline crunch, project managers do not have time to wade through a workbook or online curriculum to locate answers. Ask My PM Coach enables PM’s to get just-in-time responses to burning project management questions.”
The tool provides soup-to-nuts information for every phase of a project: initiating, planning, executing, controlling, and closing. Users can find tips for managing risk, scope, schedule, people, communication, estimating, and more, as well as tricks to get the most from project management tools.
Designed for project managers who have spent time in a classroom, it helps folks translate textbook knowledge into real-world projects.
“In most any sport, players can get advice from their coach in the middle of competition,” explains Snyder. “Ask My PM Coach provides this type of real-time support for project managers—in a friendly, relaxed, accessible way that won’t sideline your key players.”
Companies can purchase bulk licenses for all the project managers in their organization. Or project managers can purchase a license individually.
For more information on Ask My PM Coach, or to learn about Systemation, contact Laurel Bretting at 1.800.747.9783.
PLUMgrid, Inc. today announced that it has secured $10.7 million in Series A Funding from US Venture Partners (USVP) and Hummer Winblad Venture Partners. PLUMgrid, with nearly two years of development completed, is pioneering an ecosystem-driven network infrastructure built on software-defined networking (SDN) concepts. The company will deliver network virtualization solutions that will enable businesses to manage their physical, virtual and cloud datacenters with greater agility and efficiency.
In 2011, PLUMgrid raised an initial funding round of $2 million, and USVP partner Chris Rust joined the company’s Board of Directors. Hummer Winblad managing director Lars Leckie co-led the PLUMgrid series A and now joins Rust on the PLUMgrid Board of Directors.
PLUMgrid CEO Awais Nemat co-founded the company in early 2011, and has brought together an outstanding team of industry veterans with a proven track record of success in designing, developing and deploying some of the most important systems and services in the history of the networking industry. Nemat has assembled a group of highly decorated innovators from companies such as Cisco Systems, Marvell, Nicira, SUN, Vyatta and VMware. With a strong heritage in mission-critical enterprise network infrastructure, PLUMgrid’s engineers and software visionaries have contributed significantly to the emergence of network virtualization technology in the past five years.
“Network virtualization and the move to software-defined networking (SDN) is a strategically important focus area for the networking industry,” said Nemat. “PLUMgrid was started nearly two years ago with a vision of providing a better way for customers to address new networking application needs and reduce excessive costs and complexity. This $10.7 million financing round provides the resources for PLUMgrid to realize this vision and deliver a comprehensive SDN solution to our customers.”
“PLUMgrid has a compelling combination of large market opportunity, highly differentiated approach with deep IP, and an exceptional team with a track record of commercial success. USVP is delighted to be a founding investor in PLUMgrid, and to be joined by Hummer Winblad as our co-lead in what we believe to be the best-of-breed SDN solution in the marketplace,” said Chris Rust, partner, USVP.
“The networking industry is experiencing a major shift as infrastructure becomes software-driven,” said Lars Leckie, managing director, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners. “We see tremendous potential in supporting a new, unified network infrastructure that delivers value to customers by building on networking best practices yet enabling the radical agility, simplicity and ease of management that software brings to the table.”
Pattern Insight today announced that it has come to an agreement with VMware Inc. to sell its Log Insight product, together with its team and technology.
Log Insight is an analytics and log management platform that has the ability to analyze large amounts of machine-generated data in real time. It is used for operational analytics in traditional data center and cloud environments. It has the ability to discover emerging patterns and guide administrators to the root cause of problems.
For more details, read this post by the founder of Pattern insight.
For one analysis of VMWare’s deeper move into cloud management, read this TechCrunch take on the acquisition.
DocuSign announced today that Google Ventures has joined in the company’s most recent financing round, bringing the total Series D funding to $55.7 million. Google Ventures joins investment lead Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, along with Accel Partners, Comcast Ventures, SAP Ventures, and a large global institutional investor in this round. The company will use the funds to accelerate growth of the DocuSign Global Network via increased customer-focused R&D, deeper vertical industry solutions, and faster international expansion.
DocuSign’s secure, cloud-based platform helps consumers and businesses of all sizes and industries to complete transactions faster by eliminating the hassles, costs, and lack of security inherent in printing, faxing, scanning, and overnighting documents to capture information, payments and signatures. Companies use DocuSign to create better customer experiences and save money by automating and streamlining their business processes.
“The investment by Google Ventures highlights DocuSign’s value as a tech disruptor across the web and mobile platforms, from consumers to global enterprises,” said Keith Krach, DocuSign chairman and CEO. “DocuSign has become the global standard for eSignature by building a viral network of more than 20 million users that attracts 60,000 new users every day.”
“Electronic signatures are being rapidly adopted by enterprises, small businesses and consumers worldwide due to their convenience, security and ease of use,” said Karim Faris, partner, Google Ventures. “DocuSign’s market momentum, deep technology and strong team attracted us to them and we are excited to be working with the company as they scale their business worldwide extending their reach to hundreds millions of consumers.”
Global enterprises, business departments, individual professionals and consumers are standardizing on DocuSign, with 60,000 new users joining the DocuSign Global Network every day. Today, that network includes 20 million users who have DocuSigned more than 150 million documents in 188 countries – including employees at 90 percent of the Fortune 500. DocuSign is used to finish business faster across nearly every industry – from financial services, insurance, technology, healthcare, manufacturing, communications, real estate, consumer goods to higher education and others – as well every business department, including sales, finance, operations, procurement, HR/staffing, legal, and customer support.
Accedian Networks today announced the release of its Version 5.5 software, which is now available on its MetroNID® and MetroNODE 10GE™ solutions.
This latest release embedded in Accedian’s MetroNID and MetroNODE 10GE solutions enables operators to perform Y.1564 testing with multiple simultaneous flows from a single device directly from the cell site. By using multiple flows to different destinations, service providers can test different services at the same time and thereby save time, money and OPEX.
The addition of TWAMP-Lite as a second Layer 3 testing option provides further flexibility to the operators and allows Layer 3 performance monitoring with any standards compliant monitoring tools.
“This release validates our leadership position in the market and affirms our commitment to continually be bold and innovative,” said Patrick Ostiguy, CEO of Accedian Networks. “As consumers insatiable demand for all things mobile continues to put pressure on the network, and as carrier Ethernet is the technology of choice for mobile operators and service providers, we are pleased to deliver the most innovative and effective solution to meet, and exceed, the needs of our global customers.”
Fonality today announced a new release of the Fonality Heads Up Display (HUD) Mobile application delivering extensive contact center features among other enhancements. The application now offers users 100 percent management and visibility of individual queues over tablets and mobile smartphones. In addition, the solution can now be accessed by Fonality’s 200,000+ end-users across its entire cloud-based and hybrid-hosted product line including: Fonality Connect, Fonality PBXtra and Fonality trixboxPro.
HUD Mobile empowers the mobile workforce with cloud-based Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) communications and contact center capabilities in a single-view, secure, user-friendly interface via Apple or Android platforms. This announcement represents a first step in an ongoing “innovation series” of rollouts over the coming months to help growing businesses save time, communicate more efficiently and reduce costs.
“Mobility is without question a must-have to drive productivity especially for SMBs and we’ve already seen broad adoption of Fonality HUD Mobile,” said Fonality’s Chief Technology Officer Rick Bushell. “By enhancing contact center features and making the app available our entire solution base, all of our customers can work from anywhere, anytime. We are committed to delivering smart, simple and affordable business phone solutions to small businesses. HUD Mobile and the upcoming feature releases were designed to help our customers communicate more efficiently, giving them the competitive edge they need for growth.”
The exclusive Fonality HUD Mobile technology brings the entirety of the contact center environment on-the-go. All activities in the queue, including current and pending calls, can be accessed complemented by real-time performance metrics for quality control. Managers enjoy a 360-degree view of all communications, including color-coded agent status, call types and duration. In addition, they have the ability to record calls on-the-fly or join through barge, monitor or whisper modes. Agents can also log in and out of queues to maintain high levels of customer service.
“As a global wine distributor we are extremely busy and often work remotely,” said Justin Hammer, vice president of B-21. “Because our industry is so competitive, we have to be in touch with our global network of buyers to ensure that we have the most popular wines available as quickly as possible. Fonality HUD Mobile allows us to stay connected around the world so we can make quick purchasing decisions to add the latest wines to our catalog. This flexibility has improved our productivity and profitability, because we can stock wines faster. In fact, we recently secured a new wine, made it available online and sold out within a single day solely because of the efficiencies enabled by Fonality HUD Mobile. It is a real difference maker!”
Fonality HUD Mobile creates the same experience as its award-winning desktop counterpart. The mobile solution connects phones, desktops and critical business applications with access to presence and collaboration capabilities. “Find me/follow me” provides seamless connectivity between desktop and mobile devices, along with unified messaging and Microsoft Outlook integration. For improved productivity, other features include company directory, visual voicemail, virtual conference room access, as well as photo caller ID, ring-back and on-the-fly call recording. To control costs and preserve cell minutes, Wi-Fi connectivity can also be activated.
Nuance Communications today introduced Nina, the virtual assistant for mobile customer service apps. With Nina, companies can add speech-based virtual assistant capabilities to their existing iOS and Android mobile apps, enhancing the self-service experience for their customers. Nina combines Nuance speech recognition, Text-to-Speech (TTS), voice biometrics, and Natural Language Understanding (NLU) technology hosted in the cloud to deliver an interactive user experience that not only understands what is said, but also can identify who is saying it.
Nuance also announced that USAA, a leading financial services provider that serves members of the U.S. military, veterans and their families, has adopted the virtual assistant for use within its popular mobile app. A pilot is planned for August and the functionality will launch to all USAA members early next year.
“USAA’s innovative solutions are designed to make life easier for our highly mobile military service members, and increasingly for all members who now expect to get things done when, where and how they want,” said Neff Hudson, assistant vice president of emerging channels for USAA. “We believe that the virtual assistant has tremendous potential to make it simpler, faster and more satisfying for our members to manage their financial affairs on their mobile devices.”
Nina is significant because it is the first virtual assistant for mobile customer service apps to incorporate both speech recognition and voice biometrics into a single integrated solution. Nina is also the first solution that provides an open software development kit (SDK) to support the rapid integration of virtual assistant capabilities into existing mobile applications. In addition, Nina is the first to allow organizations to brand their own virtual assistant persona, including the visual appearance and implementation of optional custom TTS voices.
“Nina is a watershed innovation for the automated customer service industry, not only because it brings the virtual assistant directly into an app, but because it raises the bar through its level of interactive dialog and language understanding,” said Robert Weideman, executive vice president and general manager of the Nuance Enterprise Division. “Nina provides our customers a major competitive differentiator by enabling more successful self-service through their mobile apps. We are especially pleased to further our partnership with USAA, a company known for its innovation and approach to delivering a premier mobile customer service experience to its members.”
