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This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2008) |
FileNet, a company now owned and assimilated by IBM, developed software to help enterprises manage their content and business processes. The FileNet P8 platform, their flagship system, is a framework for developing custom enterprise systems, offering much functionality out of the box and capable of being customized to manage a specific business process.
Based in Costa Mesa, California, the company markets Enterprise Content Management (ECM) and Business Process Management (BPM) solutions in more than 90 countries through its own global sales, services and support organizations, as well as via its ValueNet Partner network of resellers, system integrators and application developers.
Contents |
Founding
FileNet was founded in November 1982 by Ted Smith and Ed Miller. A number of the first employees came from the Xerox Office Products Division in El Segundo, with others joining from Basic4 in Orange County. The early Sales VP was Larry Jordan, the Marketing VP was Dave Seigel and the Manufacturing VP was Bob Reece from Xerox's Printing Division in El Segundo. Filenet was the first company to create a commercially successful document imaging solution for businesses, in March 1985. The state of computer technology at the time required FileNet build not only its system and application software but also the hardware for its workstations and servers. This included a custom workstation running FDOS (FileNet Distributed Operating System), a customized Unix System V port, adding XNS and TCP/IP networking developed by FileNet, a custom graphic card supporting a high-resolution 19-inch monitor; an OSAR (Optical Storage and Retrieval) unit, a robotic optical storage jukebox storing up to 128 2.6-gigabyte optical disks along with a compliment of disk drives on the servers. The workstations were diskless and used a Network Filesystem, not Sun's NFS, to support remote file system access. FileNet also released the first commercial Business Process Management (BPM) software, called WorkFlo, in 1985. WorkFlo was a C-Shell like scripting language, written by the late John Gilbert, which was used to automate user interface functions for people using the FileNet system in production environments. An ACM Paper written by William Fisher and John Gilbert was published in the ACM Conference on Office Automation in 1986 which describes the system in more detail at that point in history. Another similar paper was published by Dan Whalen in the 1990s which gave an updated view on how the system evolved.
FileNet later enhanced their software offering by launching their "C.O.L.D." (Computer Output to Laser Disc) software in 1986 for storing print streams, thus eliminating the need to print them. COLD is now used to refer to the entire category of capture software which FileNet startedcitation needed.
Acquisition of Watermark, Saros and Greenbar
In the early 1990s, FileNet realized its document management solution was incomplete without electronic document management, a capability which it gained through the acquisition of Saros Corporation in 1995. FileNet also acquired Watermark Software, a very successful low-end document imaging solution, Watermark Enterprise and Ensemble, and a Windows-based COLD product called Greenbar. This would help FileNet be the first document management company to have a complete "Integrated Document Management" suite with document imaging, electronic document management, COLD and workflow offerings. Around the same time, FileNet delivered their own internally developed entry-level system called Workgroup. The Watermark products were retired by 1999.
In the mid-1990s, FileNet's WorkFlo Business System had evolved into Visual WorkFlo, one of the first workflow solutions with a graphical interface for process modeling. Visual Workflo is considered a production workflow, a type of workflow software created for the automation of mission-critical, high-volume and high-complexity business processes.
Panagon
As a result of their Integrated Document Management strategy, FileNet rebranded the entire product line — the original IMS products, the Saros products, and the newly-developed client IDM products — as the Panagon software suite in 1998.
The Panagon Suite included the following products:
- Panagon Image Services (high-end imaging solution formerly known as IMS)
- Panagon Content Services (EDM solution, previously known as Saros Mezzanine)
- Panagon Report Manager (COLD solution formerly known as Greenbar)
- Panagon Desktop (new client interface created for the Panagon Suite)
- Panagon Web Services (new web interface with a common code base with Panagon Desktop; replaced Saros @Mezzanine)
- Panagon eProcess (Workflow Automation Solution built on top the Visual WorkFlo engine)
In January 2001 FileNet released Acenza as an entrée into the applications marketplace. Acenza was not broadly adopted and was later retired from the market.
Recent Events
In January 2002 FileNet announced BrightSpire, an application that was eventually rebranded as FileNet P8 ECM. There are a number of FileNet P8 ECM suites that leveraged the experience gained from integrated document management, web content management, and workflow into an integrated Enterprise Content Management (ECM) platform. In addition, it took the Workflow products and further developed analysis and optimization components with the Panagon Process Analyzer and Process Simulator, respectively. This enables organizations to analyze and improve processes. This move took FileNet into the Business Process Management field (BPM), and it is regarded as a leader in this growing area.citation needed
In April 2002, FileNet acquired Bethesda, MD based eGrail Corporation to add Web Content Management (WCM) to both the Panagon and FileNet P8 ECM families of products.
In April 2003, FileNet added eForms capabilities to the Panagon and P8 products with the acquisition of long time form software vendor Shana Corporation of Edmonton, Canada.
Also in 2003 FileNet extended the P8 suite extending compliance capabilities with the P8 Records Manager solution which helps companies solve regulatory compliance and records issues. In 2004 FileNet added Team Collaboration Manager, built on the P8 platform it is an out-of-the box solution that helps organizations to be more agile and competitive by allowing virtual team members to work together across functional and geographical areas.
Late in 2005 FileNet acquired Yaletown Technology Group of Canada, formerly a FileNet ValueNet Partner; this allowed them to further their capabilities in managing different types of content in the FileNet P8 ECM platform with the Email Manager product (which they had been exclusively marketing in an OEM agreement and was formerly sold as eCW) and furthered their reach into compliance with Records Crawler, formerly known as Universal File Importer or UFI.
They also extended their Business Process Management capabilities releasing the Business Activity Monitor (BAM) solution, which provides real-time event management and visibility of business performance data to enhance operational responsiveness and decision making.
IBM Acquires FileNet
On August 10 2006, IBM agreed to acquire FileNet for US$1.6 billion dollars in cash (about US$35 per share).1 The transaction closed on October 12 2006.