www.saturnsys.com

Saturn Systems

Keith Erickson

October 25, 2012

Presentation Goals

• Company Background

• Business Operations

• Software & Systems Engineering

• Project & Customer Summary

• Future Growth Plans

www.saturnsys.com

Location

www.saturnsys.com

314 W. Superior St.

Duluth, MN

Business Motivation

• Risks – Owners & families make personal sacrifices

– Typically work long hours

– Difficult to escape work pressures

• Rewards – Responsible for own destiny

– Can set own goals & objectives

– Customer appreciation validates hard work

www.saturnsys.com

Saturn Systems History

• Founded in 1990 in Duluth, Minnesota

• Origins in Device Control and Integration, Detailed Engineering

• Since 2000, Focus Changed to Enterprise Application Development

• 25% Growth Annually Since 2006

• Recognized in the Inc. 5000 for 2011, 2012

www.saturnsys.com

Rural Outsourcing

• U.S. alternative to off-shoring

• Saturn Systems Model

– Central U.S. Location

– Physical Office Space

– High Skill Niche (degreed engineers)

– Minnesota/Duluth

• Attractive, High Standard of Living

• Well Educated State

www.saturnsys.com

Competencies/Skills

• Design/Engineering Focus

• Microsoft Certified Partner

• Experts at Working Over Distance

• Technology Expertise – Microsoft – C#, C++, ASP.NET, SQL Server, SSRS,

SSIS

– Java Technologies

– Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP (LAMP)

www.saturnsys.com

Staff Profile • Management Team

– MSEE, ECE, CS, Math, Accounting degrees

• Duluth Technical Staff – CS, ECE, related 4 year degrees – Project Managers, Technical Leads, Senior Software Engineers,

Software Engineers, Programmers, QA Testers

• Telecommuters – Saturn employees, working from their homes in outstate areas

• Grand Rapids office – Establishing remote office in Grand Rapids, MN (2013)

• Contractors – Business Analysts, Engineers and Programmers

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Duluth View

www.saturnsys.com

Business Activities

• Operations & Scheduling

• Marketing & Business Development

• Recruiting

• Financial (taxes, accounting, forecasting)

www.saturnsys.com

Technical Activities

• Writing Proposals and Estimates • Writing Functional Specifications • System Architecture & Design • Software Development

– Device control & protocols, web applications, desktop applications, database design and programming

• Unit (developmental) testing • System-wide (beta) testing • Deployment and integration • Ongoing support and maintenance

www.saturnsys.com

Current Technologies

• Microsoft .NET Framework (C#, VB)

• ASP.Net web applications

• Windows™ desktop applications

• WinCE embedded platforms

• Java, C++

• SQL Server, Oracle, MySQL databases

• We also tackle legacy systems as needed

www.saturnsys.com

Process & Communications

• Project Portal for internal and customer communications (Basecamp) – Internal Project Checklist

– Issue Tracking

– Milestones

– Published documents

• Time Entry system for internal operations and customer invoices (BillQuick)

www.saturnsys.com

Revenue Generation

• Project based contracts – Time & Materials (hourly against budget limit)

• Off-site staff augmentation (hourly) • On-site consulting (hourly) • Timekeeping procedures

– We record all worked time in 15 minute increments, charge time to customer or Saturn administrative categories.

– We invoice customer for all ‘billable’ time, including activity comments.

www.saturnsys.com

Business Costs

• Personnel – Direct Labor (billable staff) – Management and administrative – Non-billable (i.e. “bench”) time

• Sales & Marketing – Billboards – Public radio advertising – Google Adwords

• Recruiting – CareerBuilder, newspapers, recruiters.

www.saturnsys.com

Software Engineering Approach

• Define project scope & requirements.

• Document system design, interfaces, test strategy.

• Development and unit testing.

• Beta deliverables and client testing.

• System QA testing and integration.

• Training & ongoing support.

www.saturnsys.com

Development Process

• Agile/Waterfall/Mixed – Adapted to Customer Needs & Preferences

• Staff Augmentation or Full Project Team – Architecture & Design

– Coding

– Quality Assurance

– Deployment

– Support

www.saturnsys.com

Development Process

• Lead Engineer Centric Approach

• Cloud Based Project Portal

• Consistent Project Process

www.saturnsys.com

Quality Assurance

• Developer Independent Testing

– Black/White Box Functional Testing

• Documentation

– Formal Test Plans

– Test Case Creation Tools

– Formal Test Results

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Current Project Types

• Web applications

• Device integration and control

• Telemedicine

• Staff augmentation

www.saturnsys.com

Case Study

• Web Application

– AMSOIL INC., Superior WI

– Online Store and user account maintenance

– Dealer Zone – Customized portal for over 80,000 dealers

– MyGarage™ - personal vehicle tracking

– Project management, support since 2005

www.saturnsys.com

Case Studies

• Device Integration & Control

– Wireless network of air brake sensors

– Firmware

• ARM Cortex processor

• Gainspan wireless interface

– Windows user interface

• C#.Net UI

– UDP device communication

www.saturnsys.com

Case Studies

• Telemedicine

– Beacon Federal grant

– Video conferencing

• Patient camera

• Device cameras

• Blue tooth stethoscope

– Virtual appointment

– Remote provider (doctor)

www.saturnsys.com

Case Studies

• Staff Augmentation

– Call Center web application

– .NET/Java Technologies

– Two internal teams of 3 developers each

– Daily video scrum meetings with customer teams

– VPN communication

www.saturnsys.com

Future Goals & Opportunities

• Rural IT Outsourcing – Saturn is one of a handful of nationally recognized

firms in this industry. – Our model since 1990, it only gained the moniker in

2005.

• Twin Cities, other large metro areas – Marketing to these areas through public radio,

billboards, Internet search optimization techniques.

• Local customers – A fairly limited potential market

• Planning for strong growth over the next 3 years

www.saturnsys.com

Questions?

www.saturnsys.com