VERTICAL MARKETS - March 16, 1998

FINANCIAL

German bank chooses KM solution

German savings and loan Kreissparkasse Hannover (KH, Hannover, Germany) has chosen Excalibur Technologies' (Vienna, VA) RetrievalWare as a knowledge retrieval system. Via the bank's intranet, approximately 1,400 employees in 100 offices will be able to search and extract information including legal information and procedures. KH will integrate the system with its existing Oracle databases and will consider expanding the number of licenses to allow customers to access information about real estate, the insurance market and the private investment market. Guenther Kunze, the director in charge of the project, said, "Excalibur RetrievalWare will not only enable us to satisfy the market needs, but also significantly increase our productivity."

Alliance for European financial services

Software developer Lava Systems (Europe) Ltd., a subsidiary of Lava Systems (Mississauga, Ontario), and information services provider CMG PLC (London) have signed an alliance to strengthen their positions as suppliers of information management solutions to the European financial services market. The alliance was formed to provide a solution for Eagle Star Insurance (London). Lava Systems document management, imaging and workflow technology will be used to manage data including claims forms and electronic files in direct insurance solutions provided by CMG.

MANUFACTURING

Technical documentation solution selected

GaSonics International (San Jose), a manufacturer of semiconductor processing systems, will use PC Docs' (Burlington, MA) Docs Open to manage technical documents and Enigma's (Boston) Insight to electronically publish the information. Customers and technicians will be able to access the electronic records. "The technical documentation for our semiconductor fabrication systems plays a major role in reducing maintenance costs and improving cycle times," said Avner Shelem, general manager at GaSonics. "With Insight into Docs Open, we can provide higher quality technical documentation to our customers in a more timely and cost-effective manner."

Caterpillar renews with ArborText

Caterpillar (Peoria, IL) has signed a five-year contract renewal to use ArborText's (Ann Arbor, MI) Adept Editor software. The earth-moving machinery and engine manufacturer uses the software to create and manage operations and service documentation for its product line. Caterpillar's service support department uses the software to produce 800 new pages every business day and plans to deploy the online system to remote authors in its European and Asian plants. "ArborText's adaptable, standards-based software has helped make our authoring system more productive and profitable," said Jim Reed, publications coordinator at Caterpillar.

Costume manufacturer saves time, money

Marketing costumes through a 400-plus-page catalog requires Rubie's Costume (New York) to manage a lot of images. The company, which produces costumes, makeup and accessories, turned to Warp 10 Technologies' (Toronto) System Accelerator compression/decompression software.

"A file that once took up 200 megabytes now only takes up 20 megabytes," said Roberto Trejos, creative art director for the company.

The company now gets up to 10 images per disc instead of one. When sent electronically to the printer, the images transport faster and the receiver does not need the software to manipulate the images. Said Trejos, "It's faster, manipulates images easier and saves money because we don't have to buy as many zip discs." *

DOD unites document and records management

The Department of Defense (DOD) has certified PC Docs' (Burlington, MA) Docs Open document management system with Provenance Systems' (Arlington, VA) ForeMost records management application. The combination has been approved to support the federal government's new Design Criteria Standard for Electronic Records Management Software Applications, which sets mandatory functional requirements for records management software used by the DOD. In addition to enabling document capture, search and retrieval and record declaration, the integrated solution is designed to synchronize paper and electronic media and generate audit trails in support of disposition practices. Docs Open is the first commercial off-the-shelf application to be tested with ForeMost, which is the first records management application to be certified under the new standard. The DOD's approval is the first step toward ensuring "a unified approach to maintaining, controlling and disposing of key government documents," said Martha Turner, director of federal operations at PC Docs.

Department goes to publishing on demand

The U.S. Department of Commerce's National Technical Information Service (Springfield, VA) is installing a "convert-and-publish-on-demand" program. The department will use Siemens ElectroCom's (Arlington, TX) IntelliScan 240 to convert its inventory into electronic forms and the Xerox (Rochester, NY) DocuTech 6315 on-demand publishing system to fill orders. NTIS provides on-demand archiving and publishing services to the Department of Commerce and operates as an independent service provider to other federal government agencies.

IRS site links to viewing tool

With tax forms available over the Web, the Internal Revenue Service has posted a link from its Web site to a free viewing tool from Page Technology Marketing (Page Tech, San Diego). With Page Tech's FormView reader, users can view the tax forms and publications posted in PCL4 on the IRS Web site. The free download will view up to 30 pages and print 10 pages.

Network pushes for integrated solution

VHA Inc. (Irving, TX) has signed an agreement with five of its information technology business partners to work together to develop a solution that will allow users to pass information between disparate systems and view different applications on a single computer screen. VHA is a nationwide network of more than 1,600 healthcare organizations and their physicians,

"No single company offers software solutions that are best across the board," said Scott Decker, senior director of development with VHA's information resources business unit. "We hope to be able to blend our IT partners' recognized expertise to create a seamless solution for us to market, essentially giving healthcare organizations what they want, a single point of contact."

"A second significant problem this type of solution solves is the need to streamline the flow of information across the continuum of care--something our market research said healthcare organizations want," said Decker.

VHA will work as the general contractor for the project, but VHA members will have the option to work with the IT vendors individually as well.

The companies involved in the agreement are: Per-Se Technologies (Atlanta), scheduling software; Oacis Healthcare Systems (Greenbrae, CA), clinical data repository; Healthdyne Information Enterprises (Marietta, GA), interface engine; and MedicaLogic, (Beaverton, OR) outpatient electronic medical records provider