IBM (News - Alert) recently unveiled a telecom expense management (TEM) solution designed to help enterprises manage the costs associated with the communications services needed to stay competitive. In doing so, the company picked Rivermine (News - Alert) to supply TEM software.

 

By partnering with Rivermine, IBM is able to offer a TEM solution capable of enhancing visibility into communications spending, reducing costs and increasing readiness for audits. The solution does this by automating various aspects of the TEM process, including ordering, billing and inventory.

 

Laurence Guihard-Joly, vice president of integrated communications services at IBM, commented that enterprises need TEM more than ever before because of increasing demand for “anywhere, anytime” communications services, which are inherently complex and time-consuming to manage manually.

 

“CIOs are faced with the daunting chore of dealing with the labor and infrastructure costs to manage these services and paying too much for expenses that are in error, ” Guihard-Joly said in a statement.

 

Already, IBM's TEM solution--powered by Rivermine's software--is getting rave reviews from clients. One testimonial came from Ian Primrose, who manages global telecommunications for Hess Corporation.

 

“The comprehensive TEM service from IBM will help drive down the complexity of managing our spend and improve processes for order management, bill management and dispute resolution in one integrated, consolidated and automated solution,” Primrose said in a statement.

 

In its announcement, IBM noted that the manual labor alone associated with managing communications expenses can be quite costly. On average, the company estimates that 5-15 percent of communications bills received by enterprises contain errors—errors that can add up to millions of dollars each year.

 

“By automating the ordering, billing, invoice validation and cost allocation of voice, data and wireless services, clients may be able to redeploy staff to communications projects that could provide them a competitive advantage,” Guihard-Joly explained.

 

IBM’s TEM offering, utilizing Rivermine’s software, starts off with a 6-8 week initial “engagement” period during which the client’s potential cost savings opportunities are investigated. IBM then follows up with ongoing management of cost-saving TEM processes.

 

To learn more about TEM, and about the software that drives IBM’s new solution, please visit the Telecom Expense Management channel on TMCnet.com, brought to you by Rivermine.