New FootPrints Hosting Service Offers Award-Winning Web-Based Customer Service and Support Combined with Secure IT Infrastructure and Management(email this article)

EDISON, NJ (September 23, 2003) – UniPress Software (Company Profile, Past Stories, Case Studies) , Inc., a leading provider of web-based service desk automation software, today announced the immediate availability of its FootPrints® Hosting Service, a fully-managed solution to help organizations of all sizes automate their customer service and support operations. FootPrints Hosting Service provides an affordable, easy-to-use, and fully customizable web-based service desk that can be in production in three days or less, without the back-end IT investment, use of corporate personnel, and ongoing administration. UniPress provides all the hardware, Internet connections, and experienced administration and maintenance staff.

The FootPrints Hosting Service offers an easy-to-use, 100% web-based system to significantly improve customer relationships, reduce request handling costs, and improve workflow efficiencies.  It is built on UniPress’ award-winning FootPrints® technology, used by more than 1600 organizations worldwide, and offers a multi-channel service desk to centrally track, manage, and control customer issues and service requests received from email, the Internet, fax, telephone, and wireless devices.

FootPrints Hosting Service’s comprehensive features include centralized customer issue tracking, self-service online, two-way email management, knowledge management, and powerful reporting. Customers, customer service representatives, and administrators can easily and conveniently access the hosted FootPrints system through standard web browsers.  Using the self-service online capabilities, customers can submit tickets, check resolution status, and search the knowledge base for self-help. Additionally, customer support departments can quickly launch a secure, hosted system without the burden and cost of purchasing and managing IT infrastructure, such as web servers, software, and databases.


“Many companies today are taking a more serious look at hosted customer service and support solutions,” explained Karen Smith, Research Director at Boston-based Aberdeen Group.  “Cost effectiveness is the driving force behind hosting. Fundamentally, the issue is about saving money, whether or not one considers the actual cost of software licenses, data center labor, server and networking costs associated with running applications in house, or opportunity costs associated with protracted implementations.”  

“Beyond its impressive feature set and ease-of-use, customers will find the FootPrints Hosting Service attractive because of our unique pricing and ownership policies,” explained Mark Krieger, President of UniPress Software. “Whereas other hosted solutions and ASPs lease their system over a specific period of time, our FootPrints Hosted Service allows customers to own the software.  We estimate that our hosted offering costs up to 50% less than other solutions, while providing customers with the opportunity to own the software outright from day one.”

To ensure fast deployment of the hosted offering, UniPress Software’s professional service group will assist in the set-up and configuration of the system at no additional cost. Once deployed, the system is fully customizable and can be continuously modified on-the-fly via a browser-based interface, without requiring programming, database administration, or training.

At no additional cost, the hosted system supports the ability to handle multiple projects, where each project is a separate database of related issues and communication. This enables organizations to easily automate a broad range of customer service and CRM activities, as well as internal help desk operations, development and bug tracking, IT resource tracking, and other “request-oriented” processes.

Extremely Reliable, World-Class Data Center
      The FootPrints Hosting Service offers a secure, state-of-the art data center to ensure performance and reliability. This state-of-the-art data center provides virtually unlimited capacity, multiple levels of redundant electrical power and Internet connections, 24/7 operators on staff, high performance dual/multi processor servers, and 24-hour electronic and physical security.

Unique Pricing Model
In contrast with other hosted services and ASP pricing models, the FootPrints Hosting Service pricing includes full ownership of the software. For example, a 10-agent license is priced under $14,500, with one year of maintenance included, and the annual hosting service cost is an additional $2,500 (18% of software license cost).  Existing FootPrints customers can take advantage of the hosted offerings. Contact UniPress for additional details.


About UniPress Software, Inc.
Headquartered in Edison, New Jersey, UniPress Software, Inc. is a developer of web-based service desk automation software targeting mid-market companies, departments within large enterprise organizations, and small businesses. The company’s FootPrints® product line, launched in 1996, provides a comprehensive range of capabilities to significantly improve help desk and external support operations, and is widely used by more than 1,600 corporate organizations, government offices, and educational institutions worldwide, including Prudential Financial, BHP Petroleum, IBM, Kampgrounds of America, Skechers, Charles Schwab, the IRS, and the University of Pennsylvania. For more information, contact UniPress at 732-287-2100, or via the web at www.unipress.com.