ISG Software Research Analyst Perspectives

ADP Acquires Workscape to Consolidate Talent Management Market

Posted by Mark Smith on 28 November 2010

Consolidation activity increased in the market for applications in talent management or what I call workforce performance management as ADP announced and now has closed the acquisition of Workscape. ADP is a $9 billion outsourcing provider that is well known for providing employer and payroll services; the company has been expanding its breadth of services for employers by responding to demand... Read More

Topics: Performance Management, Kenexa, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, Compensation, Talent Management

Kenexa Advances in Talent Management and Saves Salary.com

Posted by Mark Smith on 28 November 2010

Today was another inflection point for the talent management market and buyers of HR applications with the announcement that Kenexa is acquiring salary.com (NASDAQ: SLRY) pending shareholder and SEC approval. Kenexa is offering a cash-per-share agreement that should work to complete the transaction. More complicated will be figuring out how to retain the talent at salary.com; that company has... Read More

Topics: Performance Management, Kenexa, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, Compensation, Talent Management

Infopia Launches Retail Analytics for E-Business

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The rapid evolution of business on the Internet has dramatically changed many organizations’ strategies for growth and profitability, especially those in the retail sector. I have written about the importance of analytics overall and in retail, but many companies are maturing slowly in using them to analyze electronic business and commerce. Data derived from analytics can enable them to manage... Read More

Topics: Retail Analytics, Operational Performance, Commerce, InfoPia

Operational Intelligence Gets Boost from eg solutions

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The market for operational intelligence (OI) has grown as organizations realize the importance of having information in real time and in the right context. To accomplish this requires that operational data is processed as it happens, commonly by being packaged into what are called events and made available through technologies for complex event processing or event monitoring. Operational... Read More

Topics: Operational Performance, Complex Event Processing, Operational Intelligence, eg Solutions

Workforce Analytics is Easy and Simple with Accero

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

To utilize a workforce effectively requires information about it and the ability to analyze that in the context of the business’s needs. Yet it has long been the case that the use of analytics and business intelligence (BI) is least advanced in the human resources function. It remains so even as organizations introduce talent management applications to supplement or replace legacy human resource... Read More

Topics: Human Capital Management, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, Talent Management, Workforce Analytics

IBM Antes Up for Marketing Applications by Acquiring Unica

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

In a second move indicating its seriousness about competing in the market for marketing software, IBM announced its offer to acquire publicly traded Unica Corp. Unica is one of the larger providers in this space, with more than $100 million in annual revenue and 1,500 customers worldwide. Its success in very large marketing organizations, including brand-name customers Best Buy, Marriott and IBM... Read More

Topics: Sales Performance, Marketing Automation, Operational Performance, CRM, Unica

HP Scandal Reflects on Enterprise Software Issue

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The recent turmoil at Hewlett-Packard that went public with news of the resignation of CEO Mark Hurd is only superficially about the facts of the scandal or the question of who will be the new CEO, sexy as those issues may be. What it really shines a light on is the performance of the company itself. I wrote earlier this year (See: “HP Takes Technology Portfolio to the Clouds with New Growth... Read More

Topics: IT Performance, Operational Performance, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, Enterprise Software, HP, Information Management, Information Technology

Taleo Brings New Intelligence to Talent Management

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

Today’s intense competitive pressures demand that organizations utilize their human capital more effectively. Taleo has been steadily growing as a provider of talent management by offering its applications and platform through software as a service (SaaS). Now it has advanced into what they call Talent Intelligence that can help organizations gain new insights on their workforce and individual... Read More

Topics: Human Capital Management, Business Performance, Financial Performance, Workforce Performance, Talent Management, Taleo

Infor24 Makes Applications Simpler To Acquire and Integrate

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The advent of cloud computing and renting of applications has provided another realm of opportunity for applications software vendors. Infor, which already is the third-largest in the world, is taking advantage of it. Infor announced Infor24, an initiative to bring its role-based applications into the cloud. It will use the Infor ION platform that supports other new Infor applications, including... Read More

Topics: Supply Chain Performance, Enterprise Applications, Operational Performance, Business Performance, Cloud Computing, Infor

Hadoop Gets Easier with Cloudera Version 3

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

Managing large volumes of enterprise data continues to challenge IT organizations as they deal with administration and storage of no longer just terabytes but now petabytes of data and costs increase accordingly. This massive size of data complicates the underlying issues of where and how to store it easily in low-cost hardware and manage the data efficiently. One attempt at a solution is Hadoop,... Read More

Topics: Cloudera, Information Management, Data, Strata+Hadoop

Research Finds New Adoption and Interest in Mobile Business Intelligence

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The demand for access to business information and applications through mobile technologies such as the Apple iPhone and iPad, devices running Google Android or using RIM Blackberry is surging as consumer preferences and behavior spill over into the business workforce. The massive growth of adoption of these technologies around the world as consumers seek instant access to information has many... Read More

Topics: Mobile, IT Performance, Operational Performance, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, Mobility, Digital Technology

Kalido Does Data Governance Right

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The proper management of data is ever more important and complex. Business people must have easy access to data from all over the enterprise, but unguarded access and distribution may enable users to bypass the IT organization’s rules for data management, copy and paste whatever they like into spreadsheets and share it in uncontrolled fashion. Firm control of enterprise data requires policies and... Read More

Topics: Master Data Management, MDM, IT Performance, Data Governance, Information Management, Kalido

IBM’s Advances Business Analytics and Optimization in First Year

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

At its Business Analytics and Optimization (BAO) analyst summit in Washington, D.C., IBM provided direction on the state of its software and services in this category of business technology. This annual event goes back to 2005 when IBM started making BAO-related software acquisitions in earnest. I have written before about IBM’s focus on analytics and optimization (See: “IBM Fuses New Generation... Read More

Topics: Operational Performance, Business Analytics, Business Intelligence, Business Performance, IBM

Sales Compensation Easier To Manage with Varicent 7

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

To help sales teams to maximize their value to the company, sales operations and management must find the right balance of compensation and incentives to motivate them to achieve their quotas. To do this requires the ability to design compensation plans that take into consideration products, territories and accounts and of course the number of customers and prospects. Sales managers also need... Read More

Topics: Sales Performance, Sales Compensation, Operational Performance, Sales Performance Management, Varicent

Information Applications is a New Technology Category Designed for Business and IT

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

In today’s world, without information there is no business. That is, without having the right information and making it available to the right people at the right time, an organization cannot be fully informed, make the right decisions and act on them, and compete effectively enough to survive and prosper. That much is a given. Finding ways to ensure that an organization’s information is... Read More

Topics: IT Performance, Business Intelligence, Information Applications, Information Management, Data, Information Availability

Informatica Simplifies Cloud Integration with New Data Plugs

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

Businesses continually need to improve their abilities to utilize data generated by their activities and interactions. Retrieving, cleaning and sharing data are ongoing processes, and along with data within the enterprise, applications in cloud computing are becoming critical sources. Vital data about customers and even employees among many other types is distributed across the cloud and must be... Read More

Topics: Cloud Computing, Data Integration, Informatica, Information Management

Plateau Advances Talent Management in the Cloud

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

The market for talent management continues to grow as organizations realize that they have not invested enough to make their workforces more productive and valuable. Not many human resources organizations have enabled innovation in their workforce processes or taken the next step to work more strategically with finance and operations executives. Now savvy HR organizations have been renting a new... Read More

Topics: Human Capital Management, Plateau, Business Performance, Workforce Performance, Talent Management

Merced Systems Customer Summit Advances Sales and Customer Service Organizations

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

Many organizations want to improve the performance of their sales and customer service operations but have difficulty increasing efficiency and producing better results. One barrier to improvement is sticking with the status quo of managing sales operations and performance through spreadsheets, as 47 percent of organizations still do, according to Ventana Research’s benchmark research on sales... Read More

Topics: Sales Performance, Merced Systems, Operational Performance, Analytics, Sales Performance Management

iWay Software Deepens Information Management Expands to Cloud Computing

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

At the Information Builders 2010 conference I spent some time to learn about the latest in its business intelligence (BI) technology and also performance management, which my colleague has analyzed recently (See: “IBI’s Eye Popping New Performance Management Software”). But I focused more on information management, which is becoming a strategic component of the company’s portfolio. Its iWay... Read More

Topics: IT Performance, Analytics, Business Intelligence, Data Integration, Information Builders, Information Management

Softscape Demonstrates Leadership in Managing Talent with New Release

Posted by Mark Smith on 27 November 2010

Cliché or not, a business’s most valuable asset is its people, and for 15 years Softscape has been dedicated to providing applications that help human resources organizations handle a range of processes that I call workforce performance management, including what the industry refers to as talent management. Privately held Softscape operates in 156 countries, and its customers range from large... Read More

Topics: Human Capital Management, Softscape, Workforce Performance, Talent Management