VendAsta provides custom software development to large corporations that have a need to balance speed-to-market with rigorous processes. We handle complex projects from envisioning and initial development through to release and maintenance, working closely with our corporate clients every step of the way.
From 1999-2007 the founders of VendAsta worked together at Point2 Technologies, where they built, supported, and maintained the used global trading system for Caterpillar. The consumer-facing component of this system can be seen at CatUsed.com.
(Read more about how our business strategy evolved out of our background in heavy equipment sales in the VendAsta origin story.)
Since its founding in 2008, VendAsta has worked closely with two of Canada’s most innovative corporations in the industrial sector, Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers and PotashCorp.
Our relationship with Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers, the world’s largest industrial auction company, began in January 2008, shortly after we opened up shop. Since that time, we’ve built a number of core solutions now used throughout the Ritchie Bros. organization:
FAIM allows inspectors in the field to collect information about heavy equipment that is being offered for auction. Designed for handheld mobile devices running the Windows Mobile operating system, FAIM allows inspectors to record structured data, manage photos, and whiz all the information wirelessly back to the company’s appraisers in Vancouver, dramatically reducing the length of the appraisal process.
Learn more about our Asset Management solution
Since its release, RBA has contracted VendAsta to extend the FAIM system in two follow-on phases.
SFA is a BlackBerry application that integrates with several internal CRM, accounting, and data repository systems at Ritchie Bros. The application allows territory managers to review historical purchase and sales data on their phones while visiting a client. The system was designed with responsiveness and ease-of-use in mind.
Enlarging on work done in the FAIM project, DEI allows inspectors at Ritchie Bros. auction sites around the world to record structured asset data along with heaps of photographs on the tens of thousands of assets that are consigned and sold through unreserved auctions every year. These thorough descriptions and photo libraries are then made available on the Ritchie Bros. website for potential bidders to peruse.
We were contracted by PotashCorp, the world’s largest producer of fertilizer, to upgrade their printed training materials to an online platform. This system was first piloted and is now in use at PCS’s Patience Lake mine site and has recently been rolled out to a second mine at Allan, SK.
Our corporate training solution keeps track of which employees have received training, automatically generates and grades tests, and lets instructors update and revise materials as needed.
Learn more about our Corporate Training solution
Canadian Light Source (CLS) is Canada’s national synchrotron research facility. Built with an initial capital cost of $173 million, it’s a world-class research center and one of Canada’s largest science projects. In 2010 we developed software and a web interface that lets scientists from around the world remotely submit experiments to the synchrotron and track the progress of those experiments online.
