Interview with Orion Software’s Patrice Boivin: Bypassing the Rental Counter
Patrice Boivin, president, Orion Software, talks with RER about the changing business model of rental, its new shopping portal, enhanced mobile app and making rental as easy as calling a taxi.
The pandemic led a lot more rental companies to become more serious about e-commerce. What changes have you seen among rental companies as a result?
We see much more willingness to change the traditional business model of a rental shop to electronic transactions. The web portal and mobile apps have become the way to eliminate contacts and increase efficiency. Many rental companies realized that a web presence with a transactional shopping cart is essential to grow their business.
How have you developed your e-commerce capabilities to help your customers through this period?
We launched a complete new upfront Web shopping portal. This is an integral part of our Sirius e suite. Every client using Sirius can setup a Shopping web portal in a few hours. We offered a promotion with no set-up fees to support them during the pandemic. A mobile app version is also available and offers all the features of the best portal of the large rental companies. It’s very intuitive and even allow their customer to view the delivery truck moving in real-time on a map to check the expected arrival time. Renting equipment is now as easy as ordering a taxi on a mobile app.
What new capabilities, products and upgrades have you developed in the past year?
The most significant innovation for us is the upfront shopping web portal because of its unique technology that allows much more flexibility and almost no maintenance. We also developed a new BI configurable with additional performance indicators. The BI is combined with proactive management features to help users and customers to be always informed at the right time of what’s important.
What have you done to improve your software’s integration with telematics systems and other integration with machine data?
We developed integration with two new GPS readers to keep track of the meter and other events in order to improve the delivery and the maintenance of equipment. We are also using this information to show where the equipment is on a construction site and the closest equipment available to the mobile cart users.
What have you done to improve mobile capability in the past year? Is this more important than ever in the age of COVID and more people working remotely?
The demand for mobile app is amazing. We enhanced our mobile apps to a level that allows customers to ensure full accuracy of deliveries and maintenances. We even added multiple features with RFID to speed up the scanning process through an automated garage door equipped with readers.
What are likely to be the new trends/new directions in software in the foreseeable future?
The future will be mobile to the point that the traditional model of a rental store will be transformed. We already see the trend of customers using mobile apps to order equipment and pick their equipment directly, bypassing the counter. The traditional rental man is definitely out!
