Business Objects Announces Release of EPM Performance Suite

Business Objects Announces Release of EPM Performance Suite

Business Objects today announced the release of the Business Objects EPM Performance Suite – delivering key enhancements to its enterprise performance management (EPM) product portfolio. EPM Performance Suite includes the integration of ALG Software onto the BusinessObjects XI platform, the introduction of financial performance analytics, and new visualization and data integration capabilities in planning. This suite enables Business Objects to deliver the industry’s only fully-integrated business intelligence and profitability solution, and provides a powerful framework for organizations to achieve operational excellence.

The Business Objects EPM Performance Suite comes with integrated cost and profitability applications that were acquired from ALG Software in October 2006. The integration, which is ahead of schedule, puts the information and insight gained from the industry’s leading profitability applications into the BusinessObjects XI platform. This will allow Business Objects customers to put profitability information in the hands of managers via a secure and trusted platform so they are armed with the information they need to impact the bottom line.

“To meet customer expectations for an integrated suite of performance management applications, we set aggressive integration ilestones and delivered the EPM Performance Suite at an accelerated pace,” said Anthony Reynolds, vice president of EPM at Business Objects. “This release demonstrates our commitment to be the leading performance management vendor to our customers and the marketplace.”

With the introduction of Financial Performance Analytics in this release, Business Objects continues its strong focus on delivering new EPM functionality to customers. This application features preconfigured connectors to SAP and Oracle solutions, and allows users to analyze financial information using preconfigured reports, dashboards, and alerts. Financial Performance Analytics helps companies manage risk, monitor compliance, and improve performance by providing immediate, accurate, and trustworthy financial insight with a full audit trail from high level metrics down to the underlying data.

EPM Performance Suite also delivers new capabilities that allow BusinessObjects Planning to leverage functionality in BusinessObjects Data Integrator and Crystal Xcelsius. These capabilities will enhance the productivity of administrators acquiring data from multiple sources, as well as provide live dashboards for end-users to interact and see their results before committing on a course of action.

“West Park Healthcare is looking forward to being an early adopter of the EPM Performance Suite’s planning capabilities and the new functionality it will provide for dynamically updating dashboards,” said J’Neene Hauck, director of finance for West Park Healthcare Centre in Toronto. “The capability to provide individual customized dashboards and view supporting detail will be extremely beneficial for our management team.”

Business Objects EPM Performance Suite is complemented and enhanced by new EPM professional services offerings from the Decision Services Line (DSL) within Business Objects Global Services. Thousands of EPM client implementations have driven the development of DSL’s Closed Loop EPM Framework and supporting methodology. This deep project experience has also enabled the construction of a vast library of best practices that minimize project risk and bring a new perspective to the field of performance management. These new EPM services are designed to help ensure that every Business Objects EPM project achieves transformational results.

“Bringing together our business intelligence capabilities with our EPM applications delivers a panoramic view of the enterprise,” said Mark Doll, senior vice president and general manager of Global Services and EPM at Business Objects. “This release demonstrates our commitment to integrating our EPM product portfolio and providing applications that help organizations take corporate transformation strategies from the business plan to operational reality.”