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Business Review 1996/1997
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Business Review 1996/1997
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Information Systems (IS)
The quality and flexibility of the service which the Agency is able to provide to the radio community is increasingly dependent on Information Technology (IT). The Agency works to a five-year information systems strategy, which is reviewed annually, and is subject to fundamental revision in 1997. The main thrusts of the strategy are to bring the Agency's use of IT closer to the mainstream (including the adoption of industry-standard hardware and software, wherever possible) and, by emphasising the development of corporate rather than local systems, to improve the sharing of information and the accuracy of data. The main areas of the strategy are described below.
Licence administration and spectrum management
The Agency has been working with CMG on the RULES programme, which includes two projects. The first is a business process re-engineering project intended to rationalise the Agency's licensing procedures, and the structure of the licences themselves. The second is an IT project to replace all the Agency's existing licensing systems with a unified approach. When complete, the RULES system will interface with frequency assignment tools and other radio engineering systems (e.g. for satellite co-ordination) as well as the other 'corporate' systems. A key feature of RULES is the development of logical licence fee algorithms. The programme thus has a key part to play in the implementation of spectrum pricing. RULES IT is currently in the design phase in preparation for building a first implementation in late 1998 and further implementations in 1999 and 2000. Each implementation takes account of the roll-out of spectrum pricing.
Accounting, resource planning and management information
These areas are covered by the FRAME programme, consisting of the ALPACA and OPENS projects. ALPACA provides the Agency for the first time with an integrated accruals and cash accounting system, as well as supporting related areas such as time recording and cost allocation, procurement, and fixed assets register. The ALPACA general and purchase ledgers were implemented in October 1996 and time recording and procurement in May 1997. Other modules will be implemented in stages up to early 1999. The sales ledger will be closely integrated with RULES administration of customer accounts.
When the final stage of ALPACA has been implemented, work will begin on OPENS. This is conceived as an information system drawing data from ALPACA, RULES and other systems and providing greatly improved management information as well as a better means of measuring and monitoring the Agency's performance.
Spectrum planning
The third main programme in the IS strategy covers planning of the radio spectrum. Although small projects in this area have been undertaken, development of the full corporate system will not begin until the first two corporate programmes are sufficiently advanced. When complete, the spectrum planning system and database will support the Agency's published spectrum strategy.
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