In January 2004, iDSS was formed as a joint venture with Meet Minneapolis and Eutech
Cybernetics, a technology company based in Singapore with developers offshore. Seven
internet based products were developed in the first eighteen months of operation: CVB
Sales, Services, Membership, Tourism, Registration, Housing and Hotel Inventory.
Twelve clients contracted with iDSS during the first year.
In early 2005, Meet Minneapolis gained sole ownership of the company and hired a
team of developers in-house to rewrite the application suite utilizing an Application
Service Provider model. The CVB Sales, Services, Membership and Tourism systems
were merged into one application and renamed the Destination Management System (DMS).
Although this redesign project proved to be costly, it was necessary to make the
products flexible and scalable to meet the needs of our growing client base. iDSS retained
all existing clients through the migration to the new platform and all clients were
upgraded to the new software suite in late 2005 and early 2006. In addition to the existing
client migrations, twelve new clients were added, proving that the redesign was a good investment.
In 2006 nine new DMS clients were contracted while development focused on the rewrite of
the Housing and Future Hotel Inventory applications in an effort to fully integrate
them with our newly revamped DMS product.
2007 saw nine additional DMS clients as well as twenty three new Housing and/or Registration clients.
The technical team completed development of the Registration system and made enhancements
to the existing products. Also in 2007, Melvin Tennant was named CEO. Operating
expenses were reduced and a stream-lined Sales and Marketing Plan was established.
Today, iDSS has forty two Contracted DMS clients, including seven international
destinations. Our development staff is on a regular quarterly enhancement schedule
based on product enhancements suggested by our clients through user focus groups.
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