Ken Atkins, co-founder of CDA, wins the prestigious “BEST PRESENTATION” award from ODTUG for his presentation,
Test Your PL/SQL Before You Write It!. -> download paper

CDA Associates:
From left to right: Ken Atkins (co-founder), Mark Kramm (co-founder), Dave Anstey

Contact any of us at 502.386.9270.

Dolores Gonzalez
University of Texas
Pan American

Dolores won a USB 2.0 FLASH MEMORY DRIVE

Table Journaling: How and Why -> Paper coming soon!
Test Your PL/SQL Before You Write It! -> download paper

"We needed a comprehensive and highly productive software development solution to automate a critical piece of our business where other approaches had proven inadequate. Oracle's Developer Suite delivered results better, faster and cheaper."

Organization Information

UPS, the world's largest package distribution company, transports more than 3 billion parcels and documents annually. Using more than 500 aircraft, 149,000 vehicles and 1,700 facilities to provide service in more than 200 countries and territories, UPS has made a worldwide commitment to serving the needs of the global marketplace. The company is widely recognized as a leader in the use of information technology, with industry awards including PC Week Fast-Track 100 (#1 Ranking, Enterprise Network), CIO Top 100 IT Performers, and a Very Large Database Award.

Business Problem

UPS handles an average 2.2 million air packages each day, including Next Day and 2nd Day Air packages and documents, serving over 390 domestic airports and 219 international airports. To accommodate this volume, UPS uses a system of "air hubs" located around the world, with the main air hub located in Louisville, Kentucky.

At the Louisville air hub, millions of shipments per day must be sorted for delivery in the United States and around the world. The efficient operation of this facility is vital to UPS' business. Existing systems at UPS were unable to cope with the growing volume of shipments, so UPS needed to automate the overall process to maximize throughput while maintaining the highest reliability, accuracy and on-time delivery of all shipments. They kept all the original shipping information from airbills in an Oracle Database, and needed applications to query and use the data to optimize package sorting operations. After a $10M development project using visual tools from a leading software vendor failed to address this critical business problem, UPS was ready to try a fresher, more productive approach.

Solution

UPS engaged Creative Design Associates, a consortium of highly-regarded software development professionals experienced in building enterprise applications leveraging the Oracle database, to implement an Oracle-based solution. CDA proposed a proven approach based on modeling and generation of complete applications with little or no tedious coding. Using the capabilities integrated within Oracle's Developer Suite, CDA was able to develop the application in just over ten months at a cost of approximately $2M, an outstanding achievement for a project of this scope.

The development environment chosen by CDA for the project was the Oracle Internet Developer Suite (now Oracle9i Developer Suite). This environment provides an end-to-end development solution based on standard modeling and generation capabilities, with flexible deployment options for both desktop solutions and browser-based solutions. CDA knew it could rapidly build a highly cost-effective solution, which would take advantage of the performance, scalability and state of the art security capabilities inherent in the Oracle Database, which UPS was already using.

An integral component of Oracle9i Developer Suite, the Designer modeling and generation tool, was used to model the underlying business processes and ensure a common understanding with UPS of the application requirements. The resulting system was generated from the Designer models, and serves as an excellent example of what can be achieved with rapid application development. CDA almost achieved the nirvana of modeling and generation, 100% generated code. The models and the completed application continue to be managed in the Oracle Software Configuration Manager (SCM) repository integrated with the Designer environment.

Business Benefits of Using Oracle9i

An immediate benefit to UPS is the saving of development cost and time to market with CDA's application development approach using tools from Oracle's Developer Suite. When the application goes into production, UPS anticipates annual cost savings on the order of $1.3 million. The improved efficiency of the Louisville Air Hub as a result of this application is also expected to give UPS an additional competitive edge, and a strategic advantage for future business operations.

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