TakingAIIM

aiimALERT: HP climbs Tower to ECM; Stops Short of Top Floor

Yesterday HP and Tower Software announced a pre-bid agreement for HP to acquire Tower. (See press release.)

The independent/standalone ECM solution market got 1 vendor less with this acquisition, leaving this segment of the market extremely lean.  Are Interwoven and Open Text the only two top tier players left alone (belles of the ball or wall flowers?).

OK, that aside, what does this mean specifically for HP and Tower?  According to the press release, " The acquisition of Tower will add electronic records management to HP Software’s existing e-discovery and compliance capabilities in information collection and retention."  No argument there, nothing very new there either.  Under an pre-existing agreement, Tower TRIM Context was already integrated with the HP Integrated Archive Platform, providing records management within the compliance archiving platform. 

Although Tower has consistently touted its records management capabilities, it did so within a full ECM suite, that includes functionality such as workflow, document management, e-mail management, document assembly, web content management and, to a certain degree, collaboration (i.e. a small step into the Enterprise 2.0 arena). 

There is more potential to this acquisition than HP is touting in the release. Are they being near-sighted based on the previous partner relationship?  It would behoove HP to re-assess the value of this acquisition and perhaps position these new capabilities beyond records management, e-discovery and compliance, into the realm of a full fledged ECM platform offering from a systems and hardware provider, putting them head-to-head with the likes of IBM and EMC.

aiimALERT:Teragram Acquired in SASsy Move

SAS announced the acquisition of  Teragram, a  natural language processing (NLP), taxonomy generation and linguistic analysis technology provider. The acquisition will enhance SAS’ text mining and analytical BI offerings, and extend them to enterprise and mobile search. Terms of the acquisition deal were not disclosed. (See announcement.)

Typically business intelligence is associated with structured data, data warehousing and statistical models.  Those in the ECM industry who have followed the search and retrieval market know, however,  that search and taxonomy software from vendors such as Teragram, as well as Autonomy, InXight, Vivisimo, Stratify, Clear Forest, Factiva, IBM, Xerox, Mondeca,  FAST, Mondosoft, has been capable of similar intelligence and analysis of unstructured content for several years .

Despite that, all too often, enterprise search initiatives focus exclusively on search and retrieval.  While a most important and fundamental component to any ECM strategy, enterprises can extract a much higher level of value and insight if they appeciate and leverage these search and text management tools beyond search.   

This acquisition by SAS marks a new level of market recognition of the power of natural language processing.  SAS is a notable player in the BI space.  Their recognition that the level of insights possible from properly managing structured content must also be extended to unstructured content is a wake-up call to everyone.  Unstructured content grows exponentially on a daily basis, including resources such as web pages, word processing files, presentations, e-mail, to name a few. Text analytics, mining and management technology, that leverages NLP can mine the intelligence that is contained in these resources, individually, and more powerfully collectively.  The latter ability is a form of emergent technology, a function that is fundamental to Enterprise 2.0, the focus of our upcoming Market IQ (register for webinar now.) In deed, search is identified as a key enabling technology for Enterprise 2.0 in the Market IQ, and in our Enterprise 2.0 training program.

For this reason, and others, the subject of text management, search and analytics will be covered in great detail in the AIIM Q2 Market IQ on Findability.  This report will expound on the fact that there is much more to search and taxonomy than locating content, typically the focus of enterprise search.  Search and retrieval are just the tip of the iceberg.  Findability leverages the full power of NLP. The technologies that enable intelligent responses to user generated queries can also be the basis of emergent wisdom from content collections, sentiment detection, trends analysis and predictive analysis.  These applications quickly extend NLP from the enterprise search market squarely into BI, risk management and knowledge management.

aiimALERT: Open Source Players Join to Close Functional Gap

Yesterday Intalio, Inc. an Open Source BPMS company, announced a partnership with Alfresco Software, an Open Source  Enterprise Content Management (ECM) company. The integrated offering allows users to manage  document-centric workflow processes and support the collaborative development of business processes. (See details.)

Despite its age the ECM market is ripe with new beginnings.  As readers of the blog know, I am wrapping up the Market IQ on Enterprise 2.0 (register for 3/27 webinar).  Major themes of this topic include collaboration, low-barrier application development and open business models.  Part of the report looks at the intersection of Enterprise 2.0 and ECM.   Although with a slightly different perspective, this announcement by Inatlio and Alfresco does the same thing.

Alfreso provides an Open Source approach to ECM.  With the integration of Intalio, an Open Source workflow offering the ECM platform is far more complete.   But, even more fascinating to me is the fact that the integration effort was undertaken by  the Demand Driven Development (D3) model introduced by Intalio in 2006, an Enterprise 2.0 approach to development in and of itself.

There is great synergy in this simple announcement on many plateaus.  Open Source and SaaS represent new models to implementing ECM in an enterprise.  Enterprise 2.0 offers new ways to support and facilitate collaboration in an enterprise, as part of an ECM strategy.  And here the twain doth meet.  These are all industry trends that AIIM must, and will continue to monitor. 

The ECM market is anything but dull.

aiimALERT: Microsoft Takes FAST Track to Search Market

Microsoft Corp has offered to buy search software company Fast Search & Transfer for about $1.2 billion, the companies. Microsoft and FAST will hold a telephone conference to discuss the offer today at 1815 GMT. (See details )

This event is sure to shake up the enterprise search market.  But will it be the final earthquake?  The search market has always seen platform players such as Microsoft and Oracle make forays into search.  The appeal of these offerings has always been lower cost and integration into applications, leaving a market for higher end dedicated search functionality providers.  Dedicated search providers, such as FAST as well as Autonomy, Endeca and Vivisimo, to name a few, remained viable and healthy solution providers by offering state-of-the-industry search functionality.  Organizations that required substantial, independent search functionality continued to represent a fertile market for these high-end search tools. 

The likely acquisition of one of these leading search vendors (FAST), by a major platform player (Microsoft), changes the rules of that game.  The high-end functionality and expertise of FAST, coupled with the market reach of Microsoft is greatly complementary.  “This acquisition gives FAST an exciting way to spread our cutting-edge search technologies and innovations to more and more organizations across the world,” said John Lervik, CEO of FAST. “By joining Microsoft, we can benefit from the momentum behind the SharePoint business productivity platform to really empower a broader set of users through Microsoft’s strong sales and marketing network.”  Lervik certainly got that right.  (It is a shame he was not as insightful earlier this year, when he commented "We are diappointed with [our] numbers", earlier this year, in a move that certainly helped precipitate this bid.) On the other hand, Microsoft will also greatly benefit in making its SharePoint platform far more attractive, and can likely extend the search capability of “its FAST” across all Microsoft applications, rendering a virtual universal search platform.

While all search technology providers are affected by this probable acquisition, Google is perhaps the most impacted. Google has been making strategic and powerful plays into the enterprise search space, leveraging their popularity on the Internet into an enterprise search tool.  Market popularity and familiarity have greatly helped in this cause.  If anyone can claim equal name recognition in the general market, it is Microsoft, albeit not with search – until today.

This of course changes the value proposition of ECM providers that have positioned themselves as Sharepoint enhancing - including OpenText and Documentum.  Their window of differentiation continues to close.  I cannot help but wonder at which point Microsoft will find themselves back in antitrust court?

Should AIIM Market Intelligence scrap its plans for a Market IQ report on Findability in Q2 2008?  Is the subject moot?  Perhaps in the long term, but short term, this should make for a most exciting competitive market space.

aiimALERT: Search - It Ain't Over Until the Fat Lady Sings

IBM and Yahoo announced the third release (version 8.4.2) of OmniFind. (See release.)

Perhaps no ECM technology has ridden a more tumultuous roller coaster than search.  Search was in teh limelight in the late 1980s, went into near obscurity via integration in the mid-1990s, and is now hotter than ever.  With the advent of the internet, the power of effective search against vast content collections became obvious for business users, both inside and outside the firewall.   

Of late, attention has predominately been on the companies such as Google, FAST and Endeca.  These companies and their respective products do indeed represent new offerings for enterprise search, but with this announcement by IBM, we are reminded that search is still a focus for solution providers such as IBM (among others, Xerox and Autonomy).  Indeed, IBM must be credited with introducing text-based search to the market with its Stairs product more than a quarter of a century ago.  Much has been done to enhance Search from IBM since those early days.  This grandad - or  "fat lady" of the search market continues to be a player in the game with enhancements being made not only to their Yahoo internet edition, but to the OmniFind Enterprise Search tool as well.  Search ain't over yet folks, and this is likely not this fat lady's final aria.

aiimALERT: Iron Mountain and Stratify to Tie the Knot

Iron Mountain (NYSE: IRM), today announced the signing of a
definitive agreement to acquire Stratify, Inc. for approximately $158
million in cash. (See press release)

Iron Mountain and Stratify have been courting for several months.  In January of this year they announced an alliance. Today this “common law couple” announced their officially tying the knot.  The big winner here is Stratify, a company that began as Purple Yogi, offering dynamic taxonomy construction and management technology.  After floundering in the taxonomy space for a few years Stratify re-branded itself as an e-discovery service provider, leveraging their expertise and technology in a SaaS model.

Iron Mountain’s position in the paper records storage business is unparalleled.  They are in an enviable position from which they can turn these “paper customers” into “e-customers" as well.  Of course, in order to do this they have to establish a level of credibility and services in this new space.  The turning of the alliance with Stratify into an acquisition strengthens that position somewhat.

The SaaS model of Stratify complements the traditional Iron Mountain role as “custodian” of records, i.e. they will physically house and manage the electronic records and documents. It is interesting to note, however, that in our recent Market IQ on Content Security, 78% of the 600 organizations polled indicated that they would not likely implement their content security (read records management, compliance, etc.) system in a SaaS model.  As we stated in the Market IQ, this is more likely based on immaturity among the public, than legitimate concern for the model.  Iron Mountain will nonetheless, along with other players in this space, have to educate the market and overcome this resistance.  The reputation they have built in the paper world can only serve to help.

aiimALERT: Autonomy Becoming More Autonomous

Autonomy announced an agreement to acquire record and document management vendor, Meridio.  (See announcement)

The ECM industry continues to consolidate through acquisition.  With this instance, Autonomy, whose roots are in enterprise search, strengthens its offering as a platform play in ECM, more in league with OpenText, IBM/FileNet and Documentum, distancing themselves from search/navigation pure plays from vendors such as FAST, Google, Endeca and Vivisimo. 

This acquisition builds on an earlier acquisition of Zantaz, which provided Autonomy with e-mail archiving and management.  In my aiimAlert on the Zantaz acquisition, I noted that Forrester was quoted as stating the Zantaz acquisition made Autonomy more attractive as an acquisition target for the likes of EMC, Oracle and IBM.  I did not agree with that observation then and still do not.  It would appear that Autonomy is more focused on direct competition than possible acquisition.  With its recent acquisitions, Autonomy is building a content management platform.  Its strategy is markedly different from  competitors such as Oracle and EMC who built their platform from the ground up.  Whereas these companies began as a storage/infrastructure, and acquired content management functionality leading to interface and search, Autonomy started as an interface and search company, and is working its way down the functionality chain, so to speak, to include fundamental management and archival.

With the acquisition of Merdio, Autonomy positions itself as an Enterprise 2.0 platform provider.  Merdio brings tight integration into Sharepoint (including collaboration and content management).  With the anticipated integration of the rest of the Autonomy technology, including a host of search functions, workflow, SNA, tagging, and archival, a multifaceted Enterprise 2.0 platform is emerging. 

It will be interesting to see how Autonomy handles the issue of search in its solution implementations.  As stated, Autonomy began as a search tool, and added to this functionality with its past acquisition of search rival, former search leader, Verity.  But, as it morphs into a Enterprise 2.0 platform play, will Autonomy be wise to make its search functionality optional, allowing customers to plug “best of breed” search tools, search engines that are not application specific?

This news came on the heels of Autonomy stock falling after Q3 numbers were released.  (See related article)

aiimALERT: SpringCM Gets SaaSy About Workflow

SpringCM announced the availability of workflow/BPM and capture capabilities in its SaaS Document Management system.

On one level this is not news – document management systems such as Documentum, OpenText and FileNet have provided integrated workflow and capture functionality for several years.  Indeed, until now, for organizations looking at document management with a compelling need for workflow, the SaaS alternative offered by SpringCM would probably fall off the short list.  With the addition of these new capabilities, document management with integrated capture and workflow, as a service has become a viable alternative.  As I stated in a previous post focused on Alfresco, the SaaS and Open Source models are quickly becoming strong competitors in the ECM marketplace, with full functionality.

It is interesting to note that this post is being made at about the same time that Gartner released a “Magic Quadrant” on ECM vendors.  (I posted regarding this quadrant earlier this month, questioning the placement of Microsoft versus others.)  I failed to notice at the time, but was reminded by a post by Dan Ortega on his blog, that this “Magic Quadrant” is void of any SaaS or opensource ECM providers.  Dan does a good job pointing out that while SaaS vendors may be small in comparison, today, they represent a future market direction.  Here I would have to agree, especially in light of the comments I made above.   

aiimALERT: Xerox Introduces Intelligent Redaction

Today, Xerox announced the release of new technology that automates the process of removing confidential information (i.e. redacting) from documents.  Known as Intelligent Redaction, this functionality represents a new component to content security.

Today, serendipitously, AIIM Market Intelligence released it Market IQ on Content Security (download report).  In this report we discuss the challenges enterprises face, given the growing volume of digital content, the ease of sharing digital content and the growing need to secure/meet compliance initiatives.  Many point technologies are reviewed in this report.  Content Security in our definition is not a single technology, but an ecosystem that manages and protects content in context, from cradle to grave.  Intelligent Redaction is not specifically overviewed in the report, for obvious reasons, but represents a new offering under the functionality of data leak protection, which is highlighted and positioned in the Market IQ report. Intelligent Redaction includes detection software that uses content analysis to protect sensitive information on demand, in context. It can encrypt only sensitive sections or paragraphs of a document.

Intelligent Redaction represents a growing family of technologies that are designed to support online collaboration and sharing of content, while not putting the content owners at risk.  This is the value statement of Content Security.

aiimALERT: Search Market Yin & Yang Continues

Last week I posted two aiimALERTs regarding individual search solution provider’s performance in the search market – FAST in Q2 and Autonomy in Q1 & 2.   While FAST’s numbers were “disappointing”, to quote  CEO John Lervik, Autonomy had a record breaking first half of the year.  One of the points of the second blog was to offer a perspective on the growth of the search market overall.   FAST had no one to blame but themselves for poor performance.  The market was ripe with opportunity for search solution providers in the first half of this year.  This observation was further fortified by the announcement of yet another search solution provider, Endeca, who achieved record revenues with 83 % year-over-year revenue growth in Q2. This was Endeca’s 18th consecutive quarter of year-over-year revenue growth. 

Bottom line, the search market is hot (which is why AIIM Market Intelligence has targeted search – findability – for our 2008 Q1 Market IQ report). Despite FAST's poor performance of late, this is actually good news for FAST, in that as they get their house in order, the market is actively ready to respond.  Indeed, today FAST announced the results of its internal operational review and detailed plans to streamline operations in order to achieve profitable performance.

Part of this plan is to target vertical markets, namely financial services, retail, government, media/entertainment and communications. (OK - no applauds for this move FAST.  You only left out Healthcare it seems - hardly a "highly focused" vertical market campaign.)  The more aggressive and potentially fruitful part of the plan is a hard look and restructuring of internal processes - promised to yield a $12 million reduction in costs.  This included a reduction in headcount, in the end shrinking the company to approximately 730 - ouch.