Software developers Lombardi Software Inc., WebMethods Inc. and Cast Iron Systems Inc. each are rolling out products to make it easier for companies to integrate business processes.
Lombardis TeamWorks 4 platform will ease the difficulty of understanding the new information that business processes spin off by providing access to that data. In addition, the upgraded platform will enable business analysts to define what data in a process needs to be collected and, without programming or database manipulation, generate highly specific reports that reflect data elements in the process, said Lombardi officials, in Austin, Texas.
The Zero-Code ScoreBoards feature in TeamWorks 4, due this week, provides visibility into end-to-end processes at varying levels. The Zero-Code process performance and business tracking feature correlates business and process metrics between managed and external systems inside the firewall or through external participants such as customers and partners.
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TeamWorks 4s Global Calendaring feature enables multiple participants to work on single-process instances, regardless of location or schedule. Global Calendaring will be welcomed by Hasbro Inc., which manufactures about 75 percent of its products in Asia, said David Adams, Hasbros business integration manager.
“Right now, were restricted to a single business calendar—were working on a Chinese calendar, and were rolling out [TeamWorks] in Europe,” said Adams, in Pawtucket, R.I. “As soon as we get this rolling in Europe, were going to cookie-cutter [the implementation] in the United States.”
Meanwhile, WebMethods, of Fairfax, Va., will combine its namesake Integration Platform with JBoss Application Server to provide companies flexibility in their business process integration efforts. The combination, available this week, enables users to freely mix integration logic and transformations built in the Integration Platform using WebMethods Developer with business logic implemented as Enterprise JavaBeans, running in JBoss.
Separately, Cast Iron is working on the next generation of its process Application Router, which automates low-level process integration. Code-named Zinfandel, the upgrade will include an enhanced Studio Editor so that users can add new end points, orchestrations and document types using simple wizard interfaces, said Cast Iron officials, in Mountain View, Calif.
Zinfandel, due in midfall, is expected to add more scalability to the box by providing highly optimized C++ code and removing Java overhead, which allows better throughput.
(Editors Note: This story has been modified since it was originally posted to more accurately characterize the type of software that Lombardi develops.)