As I type this from the exhibit floor [though posted MUCH later, due to connectivity issues], a few themes, none of which should surprise anyone in this down economy, seem to be emerging. Or at least evident to my caffeine-deprived senses.
1. An increased focus on ease-of-use
2. Using technology to save money (yeah, I know, duh)
3. All products work marvelously
4. It really is good to see folks that you only exchange emails and occasional phone calls with. As Ben said yesterday, you can’t email a handshake.
A brief wrap follows. More to come this evening or early tomorrow.
Ease of Use
As Tim Upton, President of Titus Labs pointed out, “users want to help.” They don’t want the organization to fail. Their email product, which allows users to mark emails as they are created, sits as a toolbar in Outlook. When an email is created, a pull down menu (if you choose to actually force your users to use it, you can also create defaults based on roles or whatever you choose) appears. It takes a second and you’re done. Nearly every booth has some sort of “It’s easy” terminology. The ABBYY integration with Fujitsu's scanner (the one with the screen and the keyboard; sorry, my connection is poor) also promises ease of use when processing invoices (or other documents) in a distributed capture environment.
Saving Money
As Whitney Tidmarsh of EMC pointed out, companies are looking for point solutions. In today’s economy, no one really has the time, or budget, to implement as infrastructure. EMC is rolling out a Case Management offering with much functionality preconfigured. A common complaint against EMC, and other larger vendors, is the amount of services charged by the company during implementation. The case management offering comes preconfigured, with claims management among others, and Tidmarsh estimates a one to two ratio of software to services – a big change for EMC. Digitech and Dan Carmel, president of SpringCM, both echo the need to save money. As SaaS providers (Digitech also sells its software), both point to the now-standard benefits of SaaS—ease of install, no capital investment, easy upgrades, ease of use, etc. Digitech points to a five to one ratio of ImageSilo (Digitech’s Saas offering) to software sales. Carmel points to continued growth of his company, even in this down economy. Pete Guinard of Cox echoes his arguments as a user of SpringCM. Noreen Plath of U.S. Archive also praised SpringCM’s ease of use (and by extension the entire concept of SaaS). [US Archive is also doing some interesting things with enabling those with disabilities to have a job. Look for more on them in a month or so.]
I also noted an 813% ROI from Bigelow Tea’s use of their software (that number was confirmed by Nucleus Research’s Rebecca Wettemen). No insight here, I just love the number. 813%.
Vital Path’s president, Jay Rothe, who’s product enables migration of content, which consolidates repositories and thus eases support contracts, among other benefits, is offering Pathbuilder for rent. I joked it was a rent-to-own plan. He has other reasons for bringing the price point of migration down, which I’ll go into next week. They also have done research indicating tremendous savings in using their product.
What’s in a Name?
For whatever reason, I enjoy seeing the names of companies. There’s generally always a new one out there. I found two today. Fishbowl, in Oracle’s booth, is an integrator of Oracles Universal Content Management product. Of Smarsh, my favorite name so far, I have no idea what they do, but intend to find out tomorrow.
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