1 Million People Choose Serena Software OpenProj(TM) Over Microsoft(R) Project

Feb. 25, 2009 - PRLog -- More than 1 million people have downloaded Serena Software's free, open source project management software, OpenProj, making it the second most popular project management product next to Microsoft Project.



As the global recession forces workers to do more with less, OpenProj is fast becoming an attractive alternative to Microsoft Office Project Professional, which costs approximately $1,000 per user. In fact, more than 400,000 people have downloaded OpenProj in the last three months, and Serena currently sees 3,000 to 5,000 new downloads per day.



Available in 142 countries and 16 languages, OpenProj is widely adopted in the United States, which accounts for approximately 59 percent of all downloads. The Asia-Pacific region represents 10 percent of all downloads, and Europe about 12 percent. Serena projects that European uptake on OpenProj will continue given the emphasis European governments and IT departments place on the use of open source software.



One reason for the widespread adoption of OpenProj is that it takes only minutes to download from the Web, and users can then immediately access all of their existing Microsoft Project files and continue working. The migration is seamless and immediate.



"Anyone who manages projects today deserves this free, open source solution as a replacement for their commercial desktop application," said Rene Bonvanie, senior vice president of Marketing, Information Technology, and Serena On Demand. "The cost savings alone easily warrant the switch, plus the functionality in OpenProj is the same as Microsoft Project. This makes it an easy decision for any project manager."



About Serena OpenProj

OpenProj is an open source desktop project management application available under the Common Public Attribution License (CPAL) for individual project managers to download free of charge. OpenProj offers similar functionality as Microsoft Project -- with support for multiple platforms including Linux, Unix, Mac and Windows operating systems. OpenProj works with leading open source office suites including Sun's StarOffice, IBM Symphony, and OpenOffice.org, which boasts 100 million users. This shows there is considerable market opportunity for open source alternatives to commercial desktop software applications.



Serena Project and Portfolio Management Solutions

OpenProj is part of Serena's project and portfolio management product line, which also includes Projects On Demand(TM) and Serena® Mariner®.

Projects On Demand is a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution designed for small to medium-sized organizations (SMBs) where several users collaborate on multiple group projects. It eliminates the complexity of deploying Microsoft Project for large, geographically dispersed teams. It builds on the functionality in OpenProj by delivering additional multi-project, collaboration, reporting, and management features for a small subscription fee.



Projects On Demand: Good Enough IS Good Enough

Project managers often struggle to find tools that will simply and cost- effectively allow them to share project details with multiple team members, without the feature overkill typical in many enterprise software packages. For example, Marlene Summers, a certified project manager and SaaS Operations Project Manager at Serena Software, was once a regular Microsoft Project user. However, she found it difficult to manage projects efficiently since colleagues were not given access to the program due to high license and maintenance costs. To keep co-workers up to date, she had to take screen shots in Microsoft Project and then share them with colleagues via email. It proved to be extremely time consuming, didn't account for frequent changes, and version control was a major headache.

Then Marlene made the switch to OpenProj, which she found adequate for personal project management. As the number of projects Marlene managed grew, as well as the number of people involved with each project, she decided to upgrade to Projects On Demand. The download was fast and straightforward, and she was able to set up multiple projects, each with several sub-projects, managing thousands of tasks for up to 50 people -- all through a single URL.



Furthermore, because Projects On Demand is SaaS-based, project managers like Marlene pay a low monthly subscription fee for a set number of seats, which you can increase or decrease online as needed. This also gives you the flexibility to reassign licenses to colleagues as needed -- including people outside your organization, such as business partners involved in a joint project.

"On premise software simply does not provide the kind of flexibility that Projects On Demand provides. I pay only for the value I get and I love that I can reassign licenses. That's perfect for a do-it-yourselfer like me," said Summers. "The reality is that in this economy, companies can't justify spending $1,000 per person for software that has the extra bells and whistles that people often don't even use. Projects On Demand is definitely good enough."



Availability and Pricing

OpenProj is available for free download on Serena's Web site. Projects On Demand pricing starts at $10 per user per month. Serena Mariner is available now for on premise and on demand implementations. Pricing for Mariner-On- Demand is as low as $18 per user per month. For more information about the expanded Serena PPM product line, visit http://www.serena.com/projity.



About Serena Software, Inc.

Serena is a privately owned company, headquartered in Redwood City, California, with 29 offices in 14 countries and more than 800 employees. Serena provides software on premise and on demand to over 15,000 customers including 96 of the Fortune 100. Serena enables teams of programmers to become more efficient by standardizing and automating development processes across both mainframe and distributed environments. Serena enables IT business analysts and power users to improve productivity with a new generation of Web 2.0 tools to build Business Mashups. Serena® Business Mashups can be used to automate common, everyday processes; they are visual and do not require coding. Serena also enables IT executives to gain visibility into their projects, resources and costs -- CIOs should have access to the same quality of information about IT as the CFO has about Finance. For more information on Serena, visit http://www.serena.com.

Serena and Mariner are registered trademarks, and OpenProj and Projects On Demand are trademarks, of Serena Software, Inc. All other product or company names may be trademarks of their respective owners, and their use is intended for identification purposes only and not in association with or as sponsorship or endorsement by such owners. Copyright © 2009 Serena Software, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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