ABM Integrated Solutions is an information technology service provider offering a wide range of IT solutions for business customers. The company was originally established in the early 1980s by Joe Shannon as a sales and support operation for electronic point-of-sale devices and cash registers. Since that time, it has grown to be a leading provider of IT solutions to customers across many business sectors.
ABM is a division of Atlantic Corporation Limited (ACL), based in Atlantic Canada. Also founded by Shannon, ACL is a major enterprise employing more than 6,000 people and providing a stable financial foundation to support ABM’s growth in a highly competitive industry. The technological landscape of the IT sector is constantly changing, and being under the umbrella of a highly successful enterprise provides ABM with the ability to continually invest in its own growth and the capacity to adapt to those changes.
Over the course of its existence, ABM has built a team of experts who are very passionate about helping their clients achieve their goals. From its humble beginning as a small field services company, that part of the business has grown substantially. Today, ABM has grown to be the largest field services provider in Atlantic Canada. Beyond this offering, it also provides business and IT consulting, cloud solutions, fulfillment services, and more. ABM is committed to bringing innovative technological solutions to help its customers face their business challenges.
Technology evolves and changes so rapidly that keeping up with all the new advances is a challenge for any company. ABM provides business and IT consulting services to help its customers understand what technologies are available, and how those technologies can help them achieve their goals. ABM’s team is made up of experts who can provide much needed guidance to ensure that customers can focus on their business objectives.
ABM helps its customers use technology to streamline their IT infrastructure by guiding them through the process of migrating to the cloud. Many companies operate today the same way they did a decade ago when it comes to IT. For instance, there are cases where each employee has a workstation computer running an outdated version of Windows. The software they use every day, like Microsoft Word and Excel, might also be legacy versions without the latest security patches, and years of work may be stored in a “My Documents” folder on that workstation’s hard drive.
Even companies with active IT departments, where version control policies mean that software updates are frequent, issues arise that can delay updates and important security patches are often installed much later than they should have been. These companies are often just one email virus, or one failed hard drive, away from a very expensive problem.
Microsoft’s Office 365 cloud platform enables companies to operate entirely in the cloud. Tools like Word and Excel are accessible online ensuring that the software is always up-to-date and secure. Files are saved securely to cloud storage where they can be accessed, modified, and shared enabling easy collaboration between employees. Everything can be integrated with email, scheduling, and many more useful features across all their devices. ABM is a certified Microsoft Customer Integration Experience Partner, which means that the company can help its customers migrate their infrastructure to the Office 365 platform and provide ongoing support.
ABM also offers on-site field support services. The company has 30 locations throughout Atlantic Canada and Ontario, and a number of partners on the west coast, enabling them to have technicians available for customers in these areas when needed. ABM Technicians are certified to work on a wide range of equipment and they have the expertise required to help customers navigate any technological challenge. They can install, configure, test, and service equipment from many leading brands and they are committed to providing the best possible customer service.
When problems arise that do not require on-site support, ABM customers have access to a highly effective multi-tiered telephone support system. Bi-lingual support technicians are available around the clock to answer questions and solve challenging technological problems. Technology can be a substantial bottleneck in the productivity of any company, but ABM is committed to helping its customers overcome these issues as quickly and as effectively as possible.
While supporting customers in the operation of these technologies is an important component of ABM’s offering, another is helping them acquire those assets. There are many challenges associated with finding and purchasing the right hardware and software solutions. ABM has established a strong network of vendors that it trusts to provide consistent pricing on high quality products. ABM has built long-standing relationships with leading suppliers over many years which enables them to access the best prices for a catalogue of more than 60,000 products. Combine this with the company’s expertise in finding the perfect solution for a given situation, and ABM becomes a valuable asset to any business.
Even with a highly reliable support team like ABM on call to help when necessary, for many companies, IT can be a challenge to manage. For customers in this situation, ABM offers a full suite of managed services so that it can take on some of those tasks for them. For disaster recovery, the company offers a range of backup and restoration services. When a disaster occurs, resulting in data loss, recovery can be expensive if it is even possible. ABM’s backup services use innovative storage technology to reduce storage costs by up to 70 percent and they are constantly monitored to ensure the integrity of all its customers’ data.
ABM also provides security assessment services to ensure that a customer’s IT assets are secure against compromise. The risk of an online attack is present and growing all the time. Internal company data, trade secrets and intellectual property, and customer information are valuable assets to cybercriminals. ABM uses cutting edge software to assess the security of its customers’ IT infrastructure, helping to protect it against these threats. As these risks continue to change, companies will need a managed security solution like the one provided by ABM to remain secure.
In order to prevent service interruptions, ABM offers a network monitoring service that can detect performance issues and outages in real time. Downtime can be expensive, but ABM’s monitoring service is always on and can detect problems before they become too difficult to manage.
When it began in 1984, ABM operated as a reseller of third-party point-of-sale equipment to retailers and offered support services for that equipment. Retail technology has evolved substantially since that time, but ABM is still providing services to customers in this area. The company’s own Market² solution is a full turnkey retail system that enables customers to integrate point of sale with back office operations for a seamless retail process.
Throughout the course of its existence, ABM has worked to help customers incorporate innovative technological solutions to streamline their businesses and add value to their offerings. By helping customers navigate the ever-evolving technology landscape, ABM has made them more competitive in the marketplace and more valuable to their customers.
