New Collaboration Manager from E2open

Updated solutions adds features to improve visibility, provide faster resolution of business process issues between trading partners

Updated solutions adds features to improve visibility, provide faster resolution of business process issues between trading partners

Redwood City, CA — November 18, 2004 — Solution provider E2open this week debuted the new release of its Collaboration Manager software, adding event management capabilities and other features designed to improve visibility into inter-enterprise processes and ensure faster resolution business process issues between trading partners.

E2open said that Collaboration Manager provides inter-enterprise event management and document collaboration functionality to enable companies to securely manage, collaborate, store and track critical business process events and content among trading partners.

The solution is delivered through a "software-as-a-service" model, which, E2open said, lowers costs and simplifies deployment. Collaboration Manager works with E2open integration and supply chain solutions, and it can be used to integrate and manage alerts from a variety of additional enterprise applications via an open interface, providing customers with an enterprise-wide event management solution, according to E2open.

Collaboration Manager includes three modules: Event Manager for assigning tasks and tracking status; Document Manager for storing, collaborating on and tracking revisions to documents; and Web Meetings for scheduling and operating interactive, Web-based meetings.

Features added to the new version of the solution include full availability and integration of the new event management module; improved systems integration, including B2B/backend system integration, an API available as Web services and an open integration interface that enables the software to plug into any enterprise application, including customer portals; and new large file transfer capabilities, providing a secure alternative to e-mail for exchanging files up to 2 GB.

In addition, the latest release offers integrated cross-domain single sign-on (CDSSO) capabilities to enable users to sign in once and gain secure access to multiple enterprise applications, and usability improvements to the graphical user interface, plus performance improvements to enable high-performance/availability in traditionally low-Internet-bandwidth regions.

According to E2open, the number of active companies on the Collaboration Manager system has grown by 420 percent and the number of files managed has grown by more than 735 percent since the product's first release in January 2002.

One E2open customer, Seagate Technologies, has deployed Collaboration Manager to more than 7,000 internal Seagate users and 700 partner/supplier users, realizing for one benchmarked inter-company coordination a 34 percent reduction in labor hours and a 37 percent reduction in labor costs by leveraging the solution.

"E2open Collaboration Manager provides a single version of the truth for managing the rapidly changing status of mission-critical business process and design data among our suppliers and trading partners," said Rick Benzo, senior director of supply chain e-business at Seagate. "We have integrated our internal systems and partner-facing portal into E2open Collaboration Manager to provide us with a seamless control point for managing supply that increases efficiency and speeds resolution of potential disruptions."

"Collaboration Manager provides better visibility, management, tracking and faster resolution of mission critical business process events for companies that need to manage a globally-dispersed supply chain," said David Hale, vice president at E2open. "It is a key requirement for companies seeking an inter-company process management solution to integrate with large numbers of trading partners and manage processes across multiple partner tiers."

The new version of E2open Collaboration Manager is currently available and delivered as software-as-a-service. It is licensed on a subscription basis and priced on a capacity-based model. In addition, Collaboration Manager is available as an add-on offering with E2open's Supply Chain Coordination Solution and E2open Trading Partner Integration Solution, and the collaboration solution is bundled with E2open's B2B Integration Solution.
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