Business Intelligence系のSaaSアプリのもう一つの事例として、ECM(Enteprise Content Management)ソリューションをSaaSで提供するベンダ、Datum International社の紹介。
ドキュメント管理、BPM(Business Processing Management)、コラボレーション、企業内サーチ、イントラネット/ポータルサイト/Webサイトへの情報掲載、等の機能を一括して提供する。
Datum International, a provider of enterprise content management (ECM) solutions, announced the launch of KnowledgeWorker enterprise content management Software-as-a-Service (SaaS (News - Alert)) offering.
KnowledgeWorker enables employees, customers and suppliers to collaborate on information and to participate in managed and audited business processes. With a fully integrated suite of modules for document management (DMS), scanning, business process management (BPM), collaboration, enterprise search and 'on-the-fly' publishing to Web sites, Intranets and portals, it empowers organizations to make sense of unstructured data and to deploy information directly into their front office and back office processes.
Datum identified the current market trend of computer software moving in the direction of 'cloud computing' paradigm. Cloud model allows companies, especially the small and medium businesses (SMBs), to launch their applications on a service provider's space or the cloud.
Cloud or SaaS gives companies the access to their applications and data without having to build or maintain an expensive IT infrastructure. The system is also beneficial to larger IT organizations, which often need collaborative solutions for various projects.
Market research suggests that there is a large potential market for SaaS among small and medium sized companies. This is because of the advantages that SaaS offers to companies in eliminating many of the IT related costs.
A recent study from Gartner (News - Alert) shows that the annual cost to own and manage traditional on premise software applications can be up to four times the initial purchase price. This is mainly due to a company's need to acquire and maintain the resources to support an in-house software deployment. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) eliminates many of these costs.
According to Datum, in the current economic climate in which capital expenditure budgets are constrained, there are clear advantages for customers in accessing KnowledgeWorker on a low cost rental basis. It enables a rapid return on investment (ROI).
Datum also intends to sell or rent KnowledgeWorker to service providers as a means of generating revenues from a growing worldwide market.
The flexibility of the platform makes it suitable for any type of companies. As it can run unattended, it allows prospective customers to sign up at any time, literally 24 X 7, 365 days a year without human intervention, Datum said. The platform provides management reports of new customer sign ups and allows central administration and support of customer systems.
The company has made substantial investment in the new SaaS platform to enable its availability on a fully automated secure and reliable Internet based service. Datum has partnered with Rackspace, a leading hosting provider in UK, to provide a hosting service that incorporates the highest levels of security and the capability for software disaster recovery, the company said.
KnowledgeWorker SaaS offering has been launched with the sponsorship of the Hertfordshire Chamber of Commerce and the Westmead Business Group.
