Adobe Customer Story
Denver, running an efficient government.
Government lowers total cost of ownership and improves support by
standardizing on Adobe Acrobat with an enterprise license agreement.
“Standardizing on Adobe Acrobat
helps users work more efficiently while
streamlining support. We can then
refocus the time savings on developing
new innovations and further education.”
Frank Daidone, CIO, City and County
of Denver
SOLUTION
RESULTS
Adobe Acrobat
DIGITAL SIGNATURES
Integrated digital signatures
support a reliable audit trail
and document integrity as
materials move inside and
outside the organization
PREDICTIVE COSTS
Improved forecasting
and reduced total cost of
ownership with an enterprise
term license agreement
SIMPLIFIED ROLLOUT
Streamlined deployment to
thousands of employees and
adopted a common software
version, greatly enhancing
training and support
PAPERLESS INITIATIVE
Improved sustainability
practices by delivering
contracts, agendas, and
other documents as
electronic PDF files
Adobe Customer Story
City and County of Denver
Efficiency in the Mile High City
Founded in 1858
Nestled at the base of the Rocky Mountains, Denver, Colorado is known for its surrounding natural beauty,
embrace of a casual outdoor lifestyle, and for its elevation of 5,280 feet, or exactly one mile above sea
level. As part of a recent government initiative called Peak Performance, the city invests in employees and
services to help identify inefficiencies and deliver innovations to provide the best service possible.
Population: 650,000
Denver, Colorado
www.denvergov.org
CHALLENGES
•Improve service levels and resource
allocation to all employees
•Enhance training and support
by standardizing on a common
software version
•Meet government initiative for
more efficient operations, including
reducing reliance on paper
“The Technology Services Group employs approximately 300 staff and contractors who are responsible
for all technology in the City and County of Denver, from custom app development and ERP system
management to basic email and desktop support services used by thousands of employees,” says Denver
CIO Frank Daidone. “We’re always looking for ways to reduce costs and better allocate resources city-wide
to improve taxpayer services while saving money.”
Enterprise term license agreement for Adobe Acrobat
The City and County of Denver decided to standardize on Adobe Acrobat across all organizations and
agencies, using an enterprise term license agreement (ETLA) to lower costs and simplify management.
Although Adobe Acrobat was already used in many areas of the government, standardizing on a common
version for thousands of employees dramatically improved training and support.
By giving more than 1,200 users easy access to the same version of the software, IT training sessions
can dive deeper into Acrobat, knowing that the workflows and features are similar for all employees.
Support staff also no longer have to learn the differences between software versions, reducing the time
IT teams spend training and working on support issues.
“Standardizing on Adobe Acrobat helps users work more efficiently while streamlining support. We can
then refocus the time savings on developing new innovations and further education,” says Daidone.
Fast deployment and simplified license management were also key drivers for the ETLA. Denver was
working on a complex project: migrating all computers to Windows 7. As part of the migration, IT staff
inventoried and reinstalled the software on every workstation. Previously, having to support multiple
versions of Acrobat was time consuming because it required maintaining security updates across many
versions of the software on individual desktops.
Adobe Customer Story
“Thanks to the Adobe Acrobat ETLA, we can deploy and manage software from a central location as well as
pool licenses to effectively use all of our software,” says Gene Humphries, license administrator, Technology
Services for the City and County of Denver. “It eliminated the need to install individual software licenses onto
thousands of computers across multiple agencies and reduced the number of versions we support to just a
single, current version.”
A cost analysis conducted by the department supported that the annual cost of the enterprise license
model was less expensive than purchasing individual department and agency upgrades under a perpetual
licensing model. “Adobe Acrobat was a good financial decision for the City and County of Denver,” says
Humphries. “We no longer have to be concerned with 54 agencies separately budgeting enough money
to cover the upgrades.”
Sustainable and more secure electronic documents
“One of the most important
features in Acrobat is the digital
signature function because it
creates an essential audit trail,
preserving document integrity
within an efficient workflow.”
Frank Daidone, CIO, City and County
of Denver
Use of Adobe Acrobat continues to expand throughout government offices in Denver due to the city’s
commitment towards sustainability. As the government pushes towards further reducing reliance on paper,
PDF files fill the need for more secure and convenient digital documents. “For instance, employees often
use tablets in the field to look at contracts and other documents in PDF,” says Daidone. “Knowing that the
documents display accurately on mobile or tablet without compatibility concerns is a strong benefit of the
Adobe Reader mobile app.”
Daidone continues, “As part of our paperless initiative, we’re switching to PDF files for agendas and
documents reviewed during meetings. Instead of spending time and money to print a stack of meeting
packets, we can take advantage of mobile administrators just emailing PDF files that we can open on
tablets or laptops.”
For example, the Treasury Department requested that all 50 auditors be allocated Adobe Acrobat Pro
in the effort to support a paperless environment. This involved converting and managing all Microsoft
Excel, Word, and Outlook documents into PDF and creating PDF packages for collaboration. Having the
latest Acrobat Pro tool to combine these various document files made the difference.
“The goal is to save time, paper, and present a better overall service delivery to the constituents of the
City and County of Denver,” comments Daidone.
Adobe Customer Story
“Thanks to the Adobe Acrobat
ETLA, we can deploy and
manage software from a
central location as well as
pool licenses to effectively
use all of our software.”
The use of digital signatures also provides more secure PDF files by demonstrating that documents are
authentic and unchanged. “Whether we’re sharing information internally, exchanging data with external
agencies, or delivering information to the public, we can’t afford to jeopardize the integrity of information,”
says Daidone. “One of the most important features in Acrobat is the digital signature function because
it creates an essential audit trail, preserving document integrity within an efficient workflow. Once a
document is finalized, we use digital signatures to manage receipt of the document as it is shared with
other external agencies.”
Gene Humphries, license administrator,
Technology Services, City and County
of Denver
Through the Adobe ETLA, employees of the City and County of Denver gain access to the latest version of
Adobe Acrobat while reducing total cost of ownership.
SOLUTION AT A GLANCE
“The enterprise agreement for Adobe Acrobat enables us to predict expenditures and better budget from
year to year,” says Daidone. “Using Adobe Acrobat to expand collaboration across agencies improves cost
efficiency, productivity, and sustainability to better serve citizens.”
•Adobe Acrobat
For more information
www.adobe.com/products/acrobatpro.html
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