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As the line between collaboration and content management in enterprises continues to blur, eRoom Technology Inc. this week will announce that it is developing a package that integrates its digital workplace technology and Documentum Inc.s content management applications.
Known as eRoom for Content Management and due next quarter, the package will allow eRoom users to save content generated by their collaborative applications to Documentums content repository. Likewise, users will have direct access to documents from that repository for sharing and collaboration from within eRoom, according to eRoom officials, in Cambridge, Mass.
Peter Loupos, vice president of drug information and approval information solutions at Aventis Pharmaceuticals Inc., in Bridgewater, N.J., said his company has already built a working prototype of an eRoom-Documentum integration but welcomes the move by eRoom for the reliability and stability it will add.
Loupos is particularly interested in storing eRoom collaborative content. “We need to capture our intellectual capital and make it available for future activities,” he said.
Earlier this month, Documentum, of Pleasanton, Calif., announced new collaboration capabilities, including free-form chat and online meetings, as part of its Documentum 5 release. Collaboration content can be saved to the same repository that Documentums content management applications use, for archiving and publishing. While eRoom officials envision a complementary relationship between the two products, Loupos said hell stick with eRoom for collaboration and Documentum for content management.
“Were very happy with the position of the two products as theyre used within our company today,” Loupos said.
Not all users of content management applications are sold on the need for integrated collaboration beyond basic workflow tools and e-mail. Mattice Harris, Web branch manager at the Stanford University Medical Center, oversees about 130 authors and 40 editors using Interwoven Inc.s TeamSite content management application. The workflow engine in Interwoven sends e-mail messages on project status and assignments to users.
“Its easy for us to work together via e-mail,” said Harris, in Stanford, Calif. “As our needs grow, maybe well need more [collaboration tools], but right now thats enough for us.”