IAD builds eBusiness extension to LMS in rapid time
(Note: Agilysys, Inc. acquired Inter-American Data, Inc. in 2004.)
Inter-American Data Inc. (IAD) is an IBM® Business Partner based in Lawrenceville, Georgia, USA that specializes in AS/400 software and services for the Hospitality and Manufacturing industries. Using LANSA for the Web, IAD has given LMS, its market leading LMS property management package for hotels and casinos, an eBusiness extension called ResNet. Using ResNet, IAD's customers can now offer an AS/400 based Internet facility that checks hotel room availability and places reservations in real-time over the Web.
IAD offers an integrated hotel and casino management system called LMS (Lodging Management System). LMS automates every aspect of hotel operations from property management to credit card processing. LMS was originally developed by IBM® to support the hotel data processing needs of America's premier resorts and Casinos. LMS was acquired by Inter-American Data in 1993. Currently LMS is installed in over 120 hotels and resorts and manages over 120,000 rooms.LMS customers include many of the largest resorts in North America, including Circus Circus, The Greenbriar, The Cloister, The Riviera Hotel and Casino, Hilton Gaming and many others. The first implementation of ResNet is at The Riviera Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.
Bill Lashley, Executive Vice President at IAD, says, "Our customers are excited about ResNet. The ability for customers to check room availability and make bookings via the Web will greatly benefit our customers."
"Internet reservations should form an integrated part of the Web site of an hotel or resort. ResNet gives our customers the facility to promote their facilities directly to the public and accept bookings from any location at any time of the day"
"Selling resort facilities over the Web will not only increase efficiency, reduce customer wait time, it also has a big potential to dramatically increase sales and room occupancy.
"It has always been our aim to give hotel staff maximum flexibility to service the customer and manage their property. LMS provides an exceptional number of variations in rating, inventory management, and process flow. This flexibility is impossible for a third party Internet reservation service to duplicate."
"Our Web extension to LMS allows our customers to promote their resort facilities on the Web and take bookings and reservations directly on their Web site from guests and travel agencies, without employing additional staff or relying on additional outside expertise."
Criss Chrestman, Director of Hospitality Development at IAD, explains "We are experts in the hospitality industry and don't want to become Internet experts. We wouldn't have considered making an Internet application ourselves without LANSA. We would have outsourced the task to Internet specialists."
"I am very glad we didn't have to do that because of the application limitations we would have had to impose. We have designed ResNet to be as ‘smart' as possible, and able to be individually tailored by each customer."
"We had the initial application Web enabled the first day we had LANSA for the Web. There was little learning curve at all for our developers who had worked with LANSA before. With no previous Internet skills, it took us less than one week to learn to generate the applications with visual components and with the look we wanted. It takes our average RPG developer about two weeks to get productive with LANSA."
The original LMS property management and reservation modules were developed in RPG. LMS has grown to many million lines of code and includes interfaces to a variety of devices, such as point-of-sales terminals, telephone systems, keylock systems, in-room movies and services. New application modules and enhancements to LMS are now been done with LANSA for the AS/400.
Criss continues, "We have been able to leverage our existing AS/400 Property Management and Credit Card applications by front-ending them with LANSA. LANSA provides great productivity benefits over RPG. ........"
But building ResNet provided new challenges to the IAD developers as Criss explains. "For ResNet we have completely re-designed the user interface of the reservation system. A ‘self service' hotel booking Internet system has to be attractive and self-explaining for novice users, many of which are using the Internet for the first time in their life."
"Traditional AS/400 applications and most client-server applications are designed for expert users who use the system frequently to enter transactions. For an Internet reservation system we can't assume any application knowledge. We focus on the majority of needs in the marketplace and re-direct the user to a professional reservation staff for the exceptions."
Criss also points out that safe and fast real time access to AS/400 data is critical to Internet reservation systems. " Believe it or not, an Internet reservation that is not on-line can cost the hotel money and inconvenience the customer by not "being in sync" with the inventory availability, rating strategy, credit authorization, and customer information needed to make a valid reservation. The ability to work directly and securely with production data was one of the reasons we choose LANSA for the Web."
Criss concludes, "It is important that the generated applications are fast and efficient. You cannot afford slow response on a production system. That is another reason we choose LANSA. LANSA offers the same efficiency and speed on the server as RPG."
Company and System Information
Agilysys is one of the foremost distributors and premier resellers of enterprise computer technology solutions. It has a proven track record of delivering complex server and storage hardware, software and services to resellers, large and medium-sized corporate customers and public-sector clients across a diverse set of industries. In addition, the company provides customer-centric software applications and services focused on the retail and hospitality markets. Agilysys is a lodging hospitality software specialist (Agilysys trainers are former hotel professionals) and uniquely qualified to train and support hotel staff.
Agilsys offers an integrated hotel and casino management system called LMS (Lodging Management System). LMS automates every aspect of hotel operations from property management to credit card processing. LMS was originally developed by IBM® to support the hotel data processing needs of America's premier resorts and Casinos. LMS was acquired by Inter-American Data in 1993 and Agilysys, Inc. acquired Inter-American Data, Inc. in 2004. Currently LMS is installed in over 120 hotels and resorts and manages over 120,000 rooms.
Individual modules include:
- LMS, Lodging Management System, a property management system for hotels, casinos, and resorts. LMS automates front-office operations, such as managing the guest folio system, check-in/check-out, housekeeping and room inventory.
- Owner Accounting, for condominium properties
- CASH, Credit Authorization & Settlements for Hotels (CASH) automates credit approval and guest check-in.
- SCAS, a Sales & Catering Administration System to track details associated with functions.
- ARTS, an Activities Reservation & Ticketing System
For more information about Agilsys, Inc, ResNet and LMS visit: www.agilysys.com