Questica News

Questica launches OpenBook Project Explorer for Capital Budgets

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Today, Questica, a leader in public sector budget preparation and management software is pleased to announce the launch of OpenBook Project Explorer, its new capital budget data visualization map tool.

 

The Capital Budget module within Questica Budget, our popular budgeting and performance software now seamlessly connects to OpenBook, our web-based transparency solution to bring customers the ability to display capital projects on an interactive map.

 

The OpenBook Project Explorer allows customers to display on a map every infrastructure project, including the budget, actual spend, funding sources, and accompanying documentation, images, video, etc. Local governments, higher education, healthcare institutions and others can link related activities to showcase the depth and scope of capital projects that are happening in a city, region, state/province or country.

 

“Since launching OpenBook earlier this year, we’ve continued to listen to our customers’ increasing need for transparency and the growing interest and expectation from their citizens, community groups and media outlets,” said Craig Ross, Vice-President, Business Development, Questica Inc. “Larger capital projects, such as new buildings are notoriously complex, often spanning multiple budget years and involving additional and related infrastructure projects such as road and utility work. It’s important for organizations to be able to not only effectively communicate and build awareness for these types of projects, but also encourage collaboration, investment and buy-in from their communities.”

 

There are three key ways to making complex data more user-friendly – by making it searchable, visual and shareable. OpenBook Project Explorer can be used for better planning, discussion, monitoring and evaluation of capital budget projects with internal partners such as council and board members, staff and partners, and it provides better engagement and input from citizens, stakeholders, and the communities that are impacted by these projects.

 

“When we looked at other capital map offerings in the marketplace, we found that one of their primary difficulties was integrating data. It can take a lot of work to prepare the data sources that will form the basis for a public visualization,” states James Orr, Product Manager, Questica Inc. “Since Questica Budget is tightly integrated with OpenBook, we have no limitations on the number of datasets and types of data we can send. The information is all there inside Questica Budget and we know exactly how to transform and send it. Plus, the updating experience is just as convenient. If you see a project title or a budget number that doesn’t look right, you can adjust your data in Questica Budget, click the publish button, and be looking at your updated visualization within seconds.”

 

Questica’s OpenBook Project Explorer supports a diverse collection of data types including: separate data sets for expenses and revenues, Operating Budget impacts, images, GIS map data, related projects, downloadable file attachments, project milestones, and custom fields.

 

 

For more information on Questica’s OpenBook Project Explorer and our other solutions, please visit our website at questica.com, or schedule a personal demonstration with one of our budgeting, performance and transparency experts.

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