Metastorm Updates Business Process Management Platform

Version 6.5 of e-Work offers executive dashboards, advanced business rules management, BPEL support

Columbia, MD — August 16, 2004 — Business process management (BPM) specialist Metastorm has rolled out the latest version of its BPM software platform, adding customizable executive dashboard portals, advanced business rules management and assured delivery of process information through packaged adaptors to leading message queuing technologies, among other new features.

Metastorm said that its e-Work offering is the only BPM solution that allows customers to find hidden efficiencies within intangible assets including human, information technology (IT) and organizational capital, and leverage them to create optimized processes across the enterprise.

The system is intended to close the gaps between these siloed assets, creating a unified system designed to complement the offerings of traditional platform and application vendors and provide organizations with the ability to realize increased productivity from people, applications and processes. "Process is the key that unlocks the value of these intangible assets to yield better operational efficiency and profitability for the enterprise, and ultimately increased revenue and growth," the provider said in announcing the latest version.

Metastorm said that the features in the latest version of e-Work will enable its customers to realize greater process control, operational auditability and business agility. Version 6.5 of the solution offers the following new features:

• Executive Dashboard and Real-Time Monitoring — Building on the product's existing Business Activity Monitoring (BAM) capability, users can now monitor and manage processes through an executive dashboard interface that provides a visual view of key process data. The dashboard will provide a user interface from which executives, managers and process owners can monitor key performance indicators and drill-down into critical process alerts to take preventative or corrective action. e-Work Version 6.5 can monitor and present process data regardless of its origin, the provider said, allowing visibility into a process across departments, applications and external organizations.



• Advanced Business Rules Capability — A supplement to Metastorm's existing Rule Builder, the e-Work 6.5 Advanced Rules Module is built around the Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004 Rules Engine, enabling users to build and maintain rules in BizTalk and use them in any e-Work process. Metastorm said that its OEM relationship with Microsoft allows the company to embed, package and sell the BizTalk Server 2004 software, providing a single vendor, best-of-breed option for customers. "Automation of core business rules is critical to streamlining processes, improving productivity, and reducing errors," Metastorm said. "Centralized maintenance of complex business rules ensures consistency across processes and lowers the overall cost of ownership."



• e-Work Message Queuing Adaptor Kit — Provides a secure and assured way of sending documents and transitioning work within a process from one system to another by providing packaged integration to leading message queuing technologies, according to the solution provider. "The guaranteed delivery of information is essential when e-Work is being used as a mission-critical application or is supplying information to mission-critical systems," Metastorm said. The solution now offers support for Java Messaging System (JMS), Microsoft MQ (MSMQ) and IBM's WebSphere Messaging (MQ Series).



• Business Process Execution Language Support — e-Work Version 6.5 provides support for the OASIS Business Process Execution Language (BPEL). Processes built in BPEL can be imported into e-Work, and processes built in e-Work can be exported as a BPEL process for use by other systems. BPEL is becoming an industry standard for business process system integration and is one of the key standards shaping the future interoperability of enterprise systems, according to Metastorm.

"Enabling better and more timely analysis of current business processes, as well as enabling easy and rapid modification of them in response to such analysis is an important component of a good BPM solution," said David Kelly, president of BPM market analyst firm Upside Research. "The dashboard interface possible with e-Work Version 6.5 will give Metastorm users better insight into critical process information, while the new message queuing and business rule maintenance features enable greater security and flexibility for automating and managing complex, mission-critical business processes across the enterprise."

In addition to the release of e-Work Version 6.5, Metastorm also recently announced a partnership with Hyperion to embed Hyperion's business intelligence solution into the e-Work BPM suite for reporting and analysis. Metastorm also plans to release a Java version of its software developer's kit (SDK) next month to provide customers and partners with both a Microsoft and Java SDK to address disparate development needs.