Customer Solution Brief
/ / Engineering Firm Mines Intellectual Capital Using New Search Capability
“Just being able to find the right documents quickly is saving our employees hours of time and frustration. Using SharePoint Portal Server 2003 makes us a far more effective company.”
Francisco A. Loureiro, Senior Multimedia Developer, Brown and Caldwell
Business Needs
As the number of its shared documents grew close to 6 million, Brown and Caldwell needed a better way for employees to find existing information for use in proposal preparation and project management. The firm had multiple search engines across its 45 offices, preventing employees from conducting comprehensive searches. Rather than install an expensive document management system that wouldrequire employees to codify their documents and knowledge, the firm wanted pure search capabilities that were both powerful and economical.
The firmwanted a solution that could:
Make it easier to locate documents.
Help it reuse existing materials.
Integrate with Microsoft® Office programs.
Provide flexible sorting of results.
Solution
Although it conducted an extensive evaluation of the Google Search Appliance,Brown and Caldwell chose asearch solution based on Microsoft SharePoint® Products and Technologies, in part because of the seamless integration with the Active Directory® service and other Microsoft technology. Solution components include:
Microsoft Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003, used for indexing AutoCAD files and searching documents, Microsoft Exchange Server public folders, and HTML content.
Microsoft Windows® SharePoint Services, used for group collaboration.
Benefits
Brown and Caldwell is fostering knowledgesharing among employees, saving time, and moving projects forward more quickly.
50 percentless timetolocate materials
Five timesfaster download time for documents than with priorsearchsolution
Ability to reuse existing materials for approximately 25 percent of each project
Less than one-third of the cost of the Google solution
Minimal learning curve due to familiar, easy-to-use interface
© 2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.This solution brief is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY. Microsoft, Active Directory, SharePoint, the Office logo, and Windows are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.
Document published March 2006