Gentrack software selected to support Tasmanian Water Reforms

25 August 2010: Gentrack, a leading developer of specialist water billing and CRM solutions in Australia, announced today a contract to deploy its software to Onstream, the new common services corporation formed through the restructure of the Tasmanian water industry.

Onstream will deploy the Gentrack Velocity billing and CRM platform to support a range of corporate and professional services, including IT, billing and customer services for its three stakeholder water corporations in Tasmania.

Industry reforms in the region have resulted in the establishment of three new water corporations, taking responsibility for the provision of water and sewerage services to over 500,000 water users throughout the state, replacing the traditional council-based water services model.

“The tender process for Onstream was comprehensive given the significant impact of the pending market changes and the high profile nature of water conservation and the performance of Australia’s state owned enterprises” said Cesare Tizi, Gentrack Country Manager.

“Throughout the process, we came up against several local and international software vendors and I am pleased to say that Gentrack came out on top based on our recent success in the Australian water and energy industries, and our ability to deliver a low risk solution to meet Onstream’s business requirements. We already bill water services for Northern Territory and ACT, along with a number of other water utilities across Victoria.”

Improved efficiency, reduced cost to serve and enhanced customer service have been key objectives of the market reform and were critical factors in the decision for Onstream to implement Gentrack’s specialist billing and customer management platform. Gentrack’s partnership with water monitoring company Outpost Central, a Deloittes Fastest 500 company, has also led to plans to trial its latest GPRS water monitoring technologies in the region, in conjunction with Onstream and its stakeholder water organisations.

“This is a high profile project for Onstream, especially as other states planning similar restructures continue to monitor the outcomes of the reforms,” said Tizi. “Given the recent spate of large ERP project failures and overruns involving other vendors, Gentrack is committed to continuing its exceptional track record of delivering software and services that add real value to utilities. Our teams are very excited about project and supporting Onstream in building the foundation for providing high quality services to its customers throughout Tasmania.”

Gentrack Velocity is a specialist billing, credit and collections and CRM solution designed for water and energy utility companies and is proven in over 40 utilities across Australia, New Zealand, the UK and the Pacific Islands.

In preparation for the cutover to Gentrack Velocity in December 2010, the three water entities are consolidating their existing council systems onto a legacy billing platform (PropertyWise) and preparing data for the migration to Gentrack Velocity.