Humanitarian Software Foundation
Enterprise Solutions for Non-profit Organizations
Humanitarian Software Foundation (HSF) is a non-profit that is passionate about helping to create better solutions that benefit humanity. Our primary focus is on research and development to help create better technology and systems for humanitarian aid organizations. Secondarily, HSF is here to support worthy humanitarian non-profit organizations with grants or facilitation of 3rd party technology support. New initiatives are also in the works to develop solutions on other fronts, namely green energy.
More About Us
Software Development Strategy
2021 has brought many big changes to HSF as our software continues to evolve to best meet the needs of our customers. HSF is in the process of transforming due to the growth of the Humanitarian Enterprise Logistics Managers (HELM©) product over the years, and the continued evolution and advancement of our Web Development Framework (WDF) for the new HELM Control Panel and Portessa™ Portal Builder.
HS LLC is an entity that will be the primary provider for sales and support services for Portessa™. The main focus of HSF is on R&D for the improvement of technology solutions for humanitarian causes, as well as starting new initiatives to work with donors to help support the causes of humanitarian aid organizations.
Humanitarian Software Information and Sales
Humanitarian Enterprise Logistics Manager (HELM©) is a full featured Warehouse Management System (WMS) and Logistics solution designed specifically for humanitarian aid and disaster relief organizations. The development of core modules to benefit the unique needs of the NGO/non-profit relief organizations has been a primary initiative of HSF for the past 10 years.
Web Portal Development Software
Portessa™ Portal Builder is an integrated website design tool that uses the popular WordPress platform, themes, and design standards to build websites with enterprise level data integration for most back-end databases and systems. These web portals provide accessibility to field operations, remote warehouses, and partners via Partner Portals.
Overview
Humanitarian Software Foundation (HSF) helped develop our web based supply chain software solutions and website development tools. Our supply chain solutions are tailored for the humanitarian sector: NGO’s, humanitarian aid, and other related non-profits. Our software has grown over a thirty year history of development and implementation.
Our main services revolve around the HELM© (Humanitarian Enterprise Logistics Manager) and Portessa™ Portal Builder. HELM is our core supply chain/warehouse management solution. Portessa is a customer portal building tool that can be used to customize HELM, or to build web portals and other applications.
Supply Chain Solutions
HELM Overview
Our flagship product, HELM, is a robust and very flexible, configurable, and customizable solution designed for a variety of supply chain and warehouse management functions. It has a variety of optional modules and tools which allow the installation to be configured and scaled easily to meet different needs.
HELM Core
The core of HELM is a WMS (Warehouse Management System) featuring modules for inventory control, purchase orders, gift in kind donations, advance shipment notifications, gift valuation, order entry, picking, shipping, and history. Other optional modules include kit building, display pack handling, client management, and RF (radio frequency) barcoding.
Platform Details
HELM is a fully browser based application that can be either installed on your local server, or utilized as a cloud based SaaS (software as a service) option. The front end web interface is primarily PHP based and developed with our WDF product. The back end runs on Apache webserver and Oracle database.
Humanitarian Aid
Gift in Kind Donations
HELM addresses the unique needs of humanitarian aid organizations. Small foundations working in a local community and large NGO’s providing disaster relief world-wide all have a common thread – their business models do not fit well within traditional systems. We understand that the needs of non-profits are different. Receiving, valuing, and tracking donated goods, for example, is something that few traditional supply chain systems could address, until now.
GIK Processing
Other features built into HELM provide the capabilities for handling complex and regulated product tracking and shipping. Our knowledge and ability to address the unique needs of this very worthy group of clients, combined with experience with pharmaceuticals, medical supplies, disaster operations, international shipping, and third world countries, is the foundation that our solutions are based on.
Pharmaceutical
DSCSA Guidelines
Humanitarian aid and disaster relief initiatives commonly have to manage the logistical challenges of pharmaceutical products and other medical supplies. The complexities of handling these products abound. This is why HELM was built to support a range of complex issues from FDA DSCSA (Drug Supply Chain Security Act) compliance, donor valuations and shipping and usage limitations and restrictions, international shipping considerations, state licensing rules, demanding donor reporting, and more.
Processing in HELM
HELM is designed to handle tracking product lot numbers, serial numbers, expiration dates and other parameters, and load drug information provided by the FDA and drug manufacturers. Inbound receipt, donor ASN validations, quarantines, and outbound shipping transaction history all conform to FDA requirements. HELM has an extensive history of implementing product logistics solutions that adhere to regulations and generate useful reporting data for donors. The powerful reporting tools in HELM allow users to easily create additional reports using hundreds of standard templates or custom designs.
Flexibility and Scalability
Overview
Providing flexible and scalable solutions has been a core requirement of our software development philosophy since the beginning. For over 30 years, we have developed systems that provide administrators the customization they require to complete complex tasks. Our system provides the ability to enable and disable functions and features, change data entry pages, data fields, menus, and much more. This gives the ability to adapt the application to your needs, rather than try and make your business match a software program. HELM can be installed on-site or utilized as a cloud-based SaaS (Software as a Service) solution.
Flexible Supply Chain Management
The suite of HELM applications encompasses over 30 modules for various tasks like EDI processing, a RESTful API, the Tracelink Interface, and more. The functionality and features provide a complete supply chain management (SCM) solution.
Data Back End
At the Enterprise level, our core back-end runs on Oracle database by default. We also support IBM DB2. These databases are supported on Windows servers as well as in more substantial Unix and AS400 mid-range platforms. For smaller applications, we support a community version that utilizes MySQL.
HELM and Portessa Portal Builder
Overview
The HELM Control Panel is a suite of website and data portal development tools for designing websites, web portals, and HELM web pages. This tool can be used to quickly develop a web page, integrate customer and HELM data portals, and configure HELM.
Application Architecture
HELM fully integrates with WordPress on the front-end and with our secure Data Engine RESTful API on the back-end. This means that you can have the most popular website CMS platform and access to virtually any dataset on the back-end (not just HELM). The Data Engine provides a RESTful interface to access data from most any data source that can be accessed using Java Database Connectivity (JDBC). This makes integrating a custom data portal with HELM a breeze, and provides powerful web integration possibilities for any other legacy systems you may have.
Customer Web Portals
Customer portals for customer order entry, e-commerce, inventory logistics and many other applications can now be easily generated with our Portessa™ Portal Builder. With a cloud hosting option, we can even handle hosting of your data portals. Connecting facilities and organizations for a variety of applications and purposes is the way of the future, and where the majority of our development is now focused.
Technologies in Use
Let’s Chat!
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Humanitarian Software (US) PO Box 1170, Clemson, SC 29633
Humanitarian Software (UK) 6th Floor, 2 Kingdom Street, London, W2 6BD
Humanitarian Software (US) +1-864-642-2063
Humanitarian Software (UK) +44 203-580-4422