Wealth management firm Richardson Partners Financial Ltd., announced this week that it has selected Calgary-based M-Tech Information Technology Inc. to implement an identity (ID) management solution.
Toronto-based Richardson Partners Financial provides customized wealth management services, including investment advice, estate and tax planning.
Specifically, Richardson Partners is using M-Tech’s P-Synch enterprise password management software to improve staff productivity by enabling password synchronization, self-service password resets, and streamlining help desk assisted resets, Richardson Partners said.
Users who have forgotten a password or triggered a system lockout can reset their own passwords, according to M-Tech.
In a statement, Andrew McKinney, director of technical services for Richardson Partners said the ID management solution has served to cut down on calls to the IT department’s help desk. Deploying the P-Synch solution has meant that the number of calls made to the help desk for password resets has decreased, said McKinney – which translates into cost savings and productivity gains.
According to a recent report from Toronto-based IT research firm IDC Canada Ltd., the current IT environment dictates that ID management should be a high priority within the enterprise.
The report, User Account Provisioning: Finding the Path of Least Resistance, notes that ID management tools like the M-Tech tool can tackle business issues such as regulatory compliance, security, and IT cost and complexity.
Indeed, major IT vendors are attempting to capitalize on this growing business demand for identity and access management software.
IBM Corp, Sun Microsystems Inc. and Hewlett-Packard Co. have all made ID management-related acquisitions over the past two years. Earlier this month, Oracle Corp. acquired Cupertino, Calif.-based ID and Web services management vendor Oblix Inc. in March BMC Software Inc. bought access-control and single sign-on tool provider OpenNetwork Technologies Inc.
According to David Senf, IDC senior analyst and report author, ID management solutions address these issues by “simplifying and enabling more precise control over resource access across a disparate environment.”
