Industry Veteran Brings International Business Expertise to Local Start-Up

 ALPHARETTA, GA, April 1, 2005 – Local integration technology start-up OpenSpan today announced that it has named Pixel founder Francis Carden to head up its executive team. OpenSpan was founded by an all-star team of technologists with extensive experience in delivering solutions for contact centers, the primary initial target market for the company’s unique application integration solutions. In Carden, the team recognized both the integration technology expertise and the international business acumen that would arm them for the rapid, profitable growth of their new company.

With more than 20 years of experience in running multinational technology companies, Carden has a track record of delivering successful technology solutions to thousands of clients in more 30 countries. As founder and CEO of Pixel Innovations Ltd, Francis specialized in software integration services, partnering with organizations like IBM, Sun and Microsoft to offer his customers industry-leading solutions. Since the sale of his company to a large healthcare software integration company in 2003, Carden has been an active investor in technology companies in the United States. Now he has been lured back to the frontlines by the opportunity to head up the team at OpenSpan.

OpenSpan was founded to provide a solution to the growing need for contact centers to integrate their applications in a way that would be powerful, fast, flexible and scalable—but would not require heavy programming and extensive implementation services. Most call center representatives have to use at least two or three different applications when dealing with a customer call; many use six or more applications to complete a single call. These applications work well in isolation, doing the specific tasks for which they were designed, but they don’t work well together. They don’t communicate with each other, and create confusion and error at the user desktop because they don’t look the same or operate in the same manner. This has the predictable impact of lengthening call times, introducing inconsistencies, and reducing customer service levels, as data is manually retrieved and duplicated across these vastly disparate systems.

"This is the perfect place to establish the value of our integration solutions. In call centers, where even 7 seconds shaved off of each call can save the company $1.5 million per year, time really is money," says Carden. "Needless to say, I am very excited about the business opportunity that this represents."

About OpenSpan
OpenSpan provides a solution to the growing need for Contact Centers to integrate their applications in a way that is powerful, fast, flexible and scalable—but does not require heavy programming and extensive implementation services. OpenSpan solutions help Contact Center managers reduce call times, boost productivity and streamline operations. OpenSpan’s automation solutions can be created and deployed in a fraction of the time and cost of traditional integration techniques. For more information, visit www.openspansoftware.com.