SoftwareOne case study
Key360
Discover how KEY360 is revolutionizing project management. Developed in South Africa, this cutting-edge platform is changing the game for large-scale industrial and infrastructure projects by fully digitalizing processes, improving workflow efficiency, and significantly cutting costs. Partnering with SoftwareOne (formerly Crayon), KEY360 has expanded its reach globally, now available on the Azure marketplace. Dive into our journey of transformation and explore the unparalleled benefits of KEY360 for project management excellence.
- Client
- Key360
- Industry
- Construction and engineering
- Platform
- Azure Cloud
- Services
- Marketplace
How KEY360 is unlocking transformational change in project management
KEY360 is a technology platform that digitalizes all aspects of even the largest capital management projects. The 360 interconnectedness of data and workflows with the hundreds of companies involved at different stages of a capital project accelerates its completion while slashing overall costs.
The platform was developed in South Africa and is part of SSG Group, based in Pretoria. KEY360 has transformed the project management landscape for many of the largest industrial and infrastructure companies in Africa – but the opportunity to expand significantly in other markets is huge.
In 2021, as part of its drive to increase global visibility, KEY360 partnered with SoftwareOne which helped it gain access to the Azure marketplace.
“We’re there, we’re finally transactable,” says Steven Golding, founder and CEO of KEY360. “So what we are now doing, with the help of SoftwareOne, is to spread the word, and promote our platform.”
Why KEY360 is different
In the early 2000s, Golding was a mechanical engineer working on large-scale construction, oil & gas, and mining projects in South Africa, the US and the UK. “Managing these projects before the emergence of digital technologies and the cloud had obviously been a huge headache,” he remembers, “but I began to notice that even as companies started to invest heavily in digitalization their problems didn’t go away.”
“This is because the thinking was – and typically still is – ERP-centric. The innumerable tools, systems, and ‘solutions’ added to project management stack didn’t translate into faster, cheaper, or better execution because all these innovations were still shackled to the ERP, which are really bad in fast-moving project environments.”
Capital projects also posed specific challenges for digitalization including high workflow, multiple phases, multiples systems and collaboration requirements between multiple organizations.
Golding started to scrutinize the market for a breakthrough project management platform that truly transformed how companies control their large-scale projects. “There was nothing that fitted the bill,” he says – and so Golding decided to develop that break-through platform himself.
And so KEY360 was born. The platform provides unrivalled configurability to rapidly go live on any project with over 140 systems. Golding adds: “A capital project is a vast organization that needs to be coordinated and flow through many gates of execution into final completion. And that is what KEY360 helps you achieve.”
With the help of Microsoft, KEY360 and SoftwareOne are hoping to collaborate on developing niche AI technology
founder and CEO of KEY360
How SoftwareOne is helping to promote KEY360
Tracy Walker, Partner Development Manager at SoftwareOne South Africa, looks after SSG – KEY360’s holding company – as one of her managed partners. “Our support for KEY360 has a sales and marketing side, but there is also a technology development side where leverage that connection through SoftwareOne to Microsoft in developing niche technology such as applying AI to project management technology.
“We’ve approached Microsoft for funding to help us do a PoC with Steven and his team.”
“The complexity of data in capital projects is such that AI could – and one day will – have a huge impact,” says Golding. “But such a technology does not yet exist.”
“On the sales side,” says Walker, “SoftwareOne is talking to the Microsoft Africa Transformation Office to see if it can start matching the customer needs it is seeing across the region with the KEY360 offering.”
Golding adds: “It’s important to mention that KEY360 also supplies Business Management and Operations Management platforms. But the Capital Project Management solution is our best-seller, and for now the only solution available on the Azure marketplace.”
The second plank of the SoftwareOne sales approach for KEY360 is to identify potential customers worldwide. “We’ve just employed somebody to specifically look after the Azure marketplace, as part of our ISV team at a global level,” says Walker.
“He is now looking at our larger ISVs and saying, how do we go to market with you? KEY360 has been put forward as one of the solutions where we see most value.”
Golding comments: “As our brief case studies show – and there are many others – there is incredible value to be gained from KEY360 in savings and fluency of execution, but also more generally in project speed and confidence. Most project managers struggle day in day out with the debilitating consequences of gaps in digitalization – with KEY360 they can plug these gaps.
“We look forward to intensifying our collaboration with SoftwareOne to spread our message and give project managers the tools they want and deserve,” he concludes.
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