Resolver / PPM 2000 Incident Management Platform Profile

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Brian Karas
•Published Jun 20, 2017 12:49 PM

You might have seen the company whose employees wear hockey jerseys at trade shows and wondered "what do they do?"

PPM 2000 has been active in the security industry for nearly 30 years. In 2016, PPM 2000 was combined with risk management provider Resolver, through an acquisition of both companies by Klass Capital, to create a software platform for large organizations to manage security incidents and related risk factors.

This report profiles the Resolver (formerly PPM 2000) Perspective incident management platform, including revenue, customer base, functionalities, reporting, pricing and sales model. 

Company **********

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Reporting *** ********

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Customer ****

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Direct ***** *****

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Risk ********** ***-**

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Deployment ******** *** *******

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Competitors / ************

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Comments (16)
Avatar
Ross Vander Klok
•Jun 20, 2017
IPVMU Certified

We used to use PPM2000 when they were at the top; big, fat and happy.  Used them for years , basically from when they were a DOS program.  Got to the point where we had to upgrade to Perspective and they were grossly overpriced and customer service was nonexistent because they were the best and they knew it.  "Oh you have been a customer for twelve years? Nice, but no consideration given for that, what is the PO# or quit wasting my time!" Was the attitude.  They were the top of the industry kind of like Pelco, but with no customer service!  

Sounds like they have their act together now which is good, but we moved on to Report Exec years ago and have never looked back.

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Brian McIlravey
•Jul 10, 2017
In reply to Ross Vander Klok

Interesting feedback. As the former CEO of PPM I can say with certainty we never felt 'we knew it' for being 'at the top'. For the most part I would say the statements above about no consideration for long term customers or "what is the PO# or quit wasting my time" would not have ever been the norm. PPM and Resolver have been in business for 25+ years and have had a solid reputable history. While we certainly expect not all customers are always happy, Its concerning to see the statements above.

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Michael Gonzalez
•Jun 20, 2017
Integrated Security Technologies, Inc.

I've been using Perspective for several years now, I think it's the best one out there by far. We're using almost all of the modules, including dispatch, workflow, and visual analysis. Customer service has been helpful, but we're using the on premise enterprise version as well as spending the money on the enhanced SSA, so I'm not sure if my experience reflects the same as what could be expected for the subscription service. Personally, I don't think there should be a difference in customer service based on how much a customer is paying - that's not a good look at all.

My only real criticism is the complexity of the reporting and analysis modules. There are quite a few prebuilt reports and queries that can be run, most of what you'd expect to need for a security operation. For enterprise users, it's important to have a user friendly way of building custom reports, but that is lacking in Perspective. The upside is there are quite a few videos and classes available online, but the custom report lesson alone is several hours long (which speaks to the complexity of report building). I don't really have time for that with all of my other duties, so we're not using it to its full potential which is a shame. I'm hiring a security program analyst this year, so hopefully we'll start getting more out of all of this data we're collecting from various systems.

The dashboard for Perspective is a very useful tool for day to day use of the system. At a glance, security operations centers can see what facilities carry the most risk and can dispatch personnel accordingly. That is really a force multiplier, as we're able to cover hotspots with extra patrols until we see the numbers going down to an acceptable level through security presence and active patrolling.

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Brian Karas
•Jun 20, 2017
IPVM
In reply to Michael Gonzalez

Michael,

Thanks for the first-hand feedback. Interesting to hear how you use the software to drive guard patrols. Can you share how many incidents per week on average you enter into your system and their sources? (e.g.: guards, employees, etc.)

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Ross Vander Klok
•Jun 21, 2017
IPVMU Certified
In reply to Michael Gonzalez

Great info!  Are you using the dispatch module as well Michael?  How well does that integrate if you are?  Do you pull metrics more from the Dispatch side or the reporting side?  We have found that the bulk of our actionable metrics actually come from the dispatch side which surprised us.

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Michael Gonzalez
•Jun 21, 2017
Integrated Security Technologies, Inc.
In reply to Ross Vander Klok

Hi Ross, yes, we're using the dispatch module pretty extensively. All of the integrations w/ Perspective are relatively straight forward, Resolver assigns support personnel to those types of projects as part of the SSA. I'd say we're 50/50 as far as actionable metrics are concerned between the dispatch and incident reporting modules. The reporting capabilities are great, but the report building module is a bit confusing and cumbersome. I'm sure it would make a lot more sense if I had time to take all of the classes, but for now I'm just getting by with what I know.  

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Gregory Smith
•Jun 29, 2017
In reply to Michael Gonzalez

Michael,

 

Good morning.

Do your dispatch personnel find the dispatching module to be user friendly?  Do you recall how much training was involved before the dispatch personnel were fully functional with it?  Thanks.

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Michael Gonzalez
•Jun 20, 2017
Integrated Security Technologies, Inc.

Hi Brian, it really depends on the month, it is summer for the kids right now, so things are getting a bit busier. Our average input of incidents by month averages between 45-100, and there are roughly 75 people inputting data. We have guards at fixed guard stations entering information, as well as mobile officers using the iPad app w/ a VPN back to our servers. There is also a workflow which allows employees to report incidents via a web portal, but we generally ask them to call into the Command Center to report things.

In addition to the statistical analysis of incident data, the dispatching module provides mountains of data that can be used for various things, including measuring individual officer or team performance. For example, guard A averages 36 minutes to patrol Zone 1 at Site X, compared to guard B who does it in 15 minutes. For security operations, faster isn't always better and can be indicative of an officer who is rushing through his patrol and not really paying attention. We can also use it to randomize zone patrols at facilities to decrease predictability in case of hostile surveillance. All of the activities we program into the system can be given a time limit. This sets off an alert in the Command Center if they haven't checked in before that time expires, which serves an important safety function.

Our Security Command Center is the primary user of the dispatching module, they're inputting between 3,600 - 4,800 individual activities per month, all of which can be escalated to an incident report if needed. When they do escalate, the activities are appended to the incident report so we know the entire timeline of events.

On a side note, I'm working on an integration w/ CCURE 9000/Victor Site Manager right now which will automatically create an incident report for equipment malfunctions when the health monitor reports the loss of heartbeat reporting from any of our supervised devices. We have more than 6,000 devices connected to our system at the moment, so the more efficiently we can automate and track maintenance issues, the easier my job is.

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Brandon Knutson
•Jun 20, 2017
IPVMU Certified
In reply to Michael Gonzalez

Michael, Excellent info. What industry are you in?

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Michael Gonzalez
•Jun 20, 2017
Integrated Security Technologies, Inc.
In reply to Brandon Knutson

HI Brandon, I work for an electrical utility, we use all of these systems to monitor power plants and electric substations.

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Luis Carmona
•Jun 24, 2017
Geutebruck USA • IPVMU Certified

Do they have their own in house software integration services, or at least a list of third party developers that they can refer you to? One problem I've found with a lot of products that depend on integrating with other systems to leverage them best is they will tell you "here is our API, but you're on your own finding a code developer to write an integration for you".

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Michael Gonzalez
•Jun 26, 2017
Integrated Security Technologies, Inc.
In reply to Luis Carmona

Hi Luis, this is from their webpage: http://www.resolver.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Perspective-Connectors.pdf

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Brian Karas
•Jun 26, 2017
IPVM
In reply to Luis Carmona

Yes, they do have a professional services team that is often part of the deployment engagement to handle customizations and connectivity.

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Brian McIlravey
•Jul 10, 2017
In reply to Luis Carmona

Hi Luis,

We have a list of COTS integration we can get for you. We can also build the integrations internally if the system is not yet COTS. Contact me if you have more questions.

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Brian Karas
•Jun 28, 2017
IPVM

UPDATE - Resolver has raised another $20M for "acquisitions to expand product capability in the information security market". Klass Capital was listed as the primary investor in this round as well.

 

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Brian Karas
•Jun 29, 2017
IPVM

Spoke with Resolver about their latest funding and put together a report here: Resolver Raises $20M For Acquisitions

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