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| Taking Attendance to a Higher Platform with TimeTec Cloud |
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| - by Daryl Choo, CIO |
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| Q: |
It is a big turn for FingerTec to venture into software as their main product line. Why was the rationale behind this decision? |
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| A: |
All these years, FingerTec has been focusing on selling our biometric devices bundled together with the TCMS V2 time attendance management software. However, along the journey we have received some feedback from our loyal customers, requesting us to insert more flexible features into the software. As we tweaked the software to accommodate our customers needs, eventually we realized that this software has the potential to be the focus of FingerTec, as daily business operations in various industries are growing more and more complicated, and the capability of the TCMS V2 in governing these operations are also expanding.
As such, we have decided to revamp the existing TCMS V2 to shift the application to the Web for easier access and software updating. Hence, we started our development of TimeTec Web followed by TimeTec Cloud.
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| Q: |
FingerTec is recognized for its comprehensive time management software TCMS V2 in the industry and TimeTec is the extension of the application. What prompted the decision to introduce two TimeTec platforms, TimeTec Web and TimeTec Cloud, and what is the difference between the two types? |
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| A: |
As mentioned before, we received a lot of ideas and suggestions to run the TCMS V2 totally on the Web. Our R&D team began to work on revamping the data communication method between the terminals and the software based on RESTful web services, which is called Webster. Both TimeTec Web and TimeTec Cloud have embedded the Webster Module to enable transactions, users, and fingerprint templates to be uploaded and downloaded from TimeTec Web and TimeTec Cloud.
To highlight the difference between the Cloud and Web version of TimeTec, TimeTec Cloud is a fully managed service whereas TimeTec Web is offered as a software package. While TimeTec Web needs you to have basic knowledge on server configuration and setup, TimeTec Cloud automates everything online. All the customer needs to do is sign up for an account and purchase relevant licenses, as all the back-end processes are taken care of by our team. As easy as TimeTec Cloud is, some customers do still prefer to setup, manage, and have full control over their database, and that’s where TimeTec Web fills that demand perfectly.
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| Q: |
What makes you think that people would shift from the complementary software to the paid one? |
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| A: |
Well, I would say the main appeal for TimeTec Cloud is the overall convenience. If you take a look around today, there are many services people are willing to fork out money for when it can be simply done on their own. TimeTec Cloud is tapping on the same pull that these services have, which is the fact that it eases the burden of users from having to setup, manage, and maintain their own system. Working lives are getting more hectic by the day, and to know that the attendance of your staff is being stored monitored automatically for a small monthly fee is always reassuring. |
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| Q: |
What are the benefits of using a cloud system and who are your target market? |
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| A: |
Oh, there is a whole long list I could give you for this. But lets just skim off a few main points here. First I want to touch on accessibility. Accessibility is the key of TimeTec Cloud in more ways than one. Attendance data that is stored in TimeTec Cloud can be retrieved from anywhere with an Internet connection. That’s one form of accessibility. Then there’s the multi-user login function of TimeTec Cloud, where anyone, whether you’re an admin, supervisor, manager or staff can be assigned and account to access their own attendance information, as well as those of their staff, providing a sort of transparency and trust in a company.
To top it off, TimeTec Cloud offers several modes of clocking in to provide flexibility and mobility, with its multi-platform clock in methods. And all these features are offered at a startup fee of as low as USD 1 per month, a small cost for the convenience of not worrying about setting up the software, maintaining the servers, and backing up your company’s attendance data regularly. It’s a good deal, if you ask me!
Our targeted markets are from the developed country such as US, Australia and etc. because they are more familiar and more exposed to cloud system. With our full integrated TimeTec Cloud, you could just sign up, make payment and start using the system right away without any waiting time. Besides that, the Cloud system usage is also growing in ASEAN market. With the government initiative and incentive given for Cloud solution, it is another one of our targeted area as well.
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| Q: |
In terms of applying the system, who do you think should sign up for TimeTec Web and TimeTec Cloud respectively? |
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| A: |
TimeTec Cloud is suitable for all kind of industry from multinational companies (MNC) to small & medium enterprises (SME). With its fully managed services, customer can just sign up and start using the system. Companies that choose this approach do so to reduce cost and manpower to maintain the system.
TimeTec Web in return, is suitable for companies that wish to have more control on the software and its database access. Since our entire TimeTec Cloud is hosted in an infrastructure from USA at this moment, it might not be able to comply with certain companies that practice SOPs, which require company data to reside within its own country. So for this, TimeTec Web provides a suitable alternative to host data in an internal infrastructure.
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| Q: |
There are several other companies developing this cloud attendance service. What sets TimeTec Cloud apart from the rest? |
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| A: |
TimeTec Cloud is a unique combination of several factors. Our servers are run by the world’s leading cloud infrastructure provider, Amazon EC2, and are operated on a multi-tenanted concept. Apart from that, we promise data communication at its quickest, close to real-time, while running on firewall-friendly port. But I think most of all, what sets us apart from the rest is our Web and Mobile Check-in options, which gives users an opportunity to report their attendance on the go from wherever, whether with or without internet connection. This is one of our unique traits, and we provide these options for free to our users as well. |
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| Q: |
Having a cloud system that is implemented globally would need a lot of stability and support. How is TimeTec Cloud going to achieve this? |
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| A: |
Having our servers run on the Amazon Cloud platform provides us much more flexibility in terms of planning our server resources and usage, while enabling us to auto scale its performance based on the usage of our customer automatically. The TimeTec Cloud database also practices Multiple Availability Zone, which means that if one location of our database is experiencing difficulties, the database on another location will be automatically step up and takeover to ensure a very minimal of downtime experienced by our customers. We also have many redundant servers in place on standby, to make sure our performance is not compromised easily.
Support-wise, we will be having technicians on standby for 24hours a day, 7 days a week. For each customer, we will also assign a local reseller who’s trained and well versed in TimeTec Cloud as a support agent, in case the customer needs person-to-person support. This, among other precautions taken, is our way of preparing for Global exposure of TimeTec Cloud.
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| Q: |
Briefly, what do you think are the challenges for the TimeTec Cloud? |
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One challenge is to get the public to start accepting the idea of the Software as a Service (SaaS) concept. Even though it is not a new concept, there are still some doubts out there about SaaS, and part of our job is to eliminate these doubts. Secondly, we have to prepare for the unexpected. TimeTec Cloud runs 24/7, which means we can’t afford any downtime, and have to ensure we are prepared for any circumstance. Another major issue is maintaining a low cloud hosting cost from our part. It is our challenge to make use of Amazon’s auto scaling and high availability features to allow us to maintain low cloud hosting costs, and enabling us to offer competitive prices to our valued customers. |
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| Q: |
What would be your future plans for TimeTec Cloud? |
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We actually have some exciting plans in store should everything run smoothly as expected. We are right now in the midst of discussing the prospects of a Private Cloud in the near future, for those not comfortable with the idea of a Public Cloud system, which TimeTec Cloud is. The Private Cloud plans will include features such as personalized URL, direct database access and so on for customers who wish to have superior usage experience managed by our same Cloud engineers. In terms of integration, we are also planning to offer TimeTec Cloud API, a feature for developers to integrate TimeTec Cloud with their existing solution seamlessly. If all our plans fall as expected, we also plan to introduce an App Store for TimeTec Cloud, where software vendors will be writing in plug-and-play applications to upload to our system for users to install as they wish. It is an exciting prospect for our team! |
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| Q: |
10. What’s your advise for those who are looking for attendance on a cloud platform out there? |
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| A: |
I would advise customers to shop with careful consideration. Look for manufacturer reputation instead of just price, as buying cheap products is a strategy that no longer works. A cloud attendance software needs to emphasize after sales service as well. Also you’ll need to ensure that your attendance software grows together with your company business operations and needs, as you are sure to have more requirements to fulfill as your company grows in the future, and switching platforms isn’t really an easy option.
Having said that, TimeTec Cloud is here to make sure that most of your time and attendance requirements are taken care off. Our plans are always growing to provide more value-added features for our customers in TimeTec Cloud as well as our supported devices. And if you’re not sure what you are getting yourself into, there’s always the free 30-day trial for you to find out!
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