DOCUMENT Magazine - April 2008 - (Page 15)

name to Accellio and was acquired by Adobe. Adobe created LiveCycle forms based on the JetForm engine and has developed into the leading player in eForms. In the early 2000s, Adobe Designer and LiveCycle seemed to be everywhere. The PDF format was quite popular because it resolved the need for users to print forms easily, and the ability to add ﬁelds quickly and easily made the product popular with forms designers. However, the inability to save ﬁlled forms locally without spending a lot of money on additional software or user licenses continues to be a limiting factor for many organizations. Within the past few years, Microsoft has re-entered the eForms development space with the introduction of InfoPath. InfoPath is packaged with MS Ofﬁce Enterprise Edition, which means it is available to many large companies without separate investment. InfoPath supports ofﬁce integration, both .doc and XML formats, and is considered an extension of Word in that it supports collaboration between workgroups. By its very size and dominance of the ofﬁce environment, Microsoft has become a major force in eForms development. IBM has also emerged recently as a major player in the eForms space. They acquired a small eForms developer, PureEdge, in the early 2000s. PureEdge had developed a market within government agencies and added workﬂow capabilities to their software. IBM renamed the product IBM Workplace Forms. Meanwhile, FileNet (a workﬂow company) acquired another eForms developer, Shana Corp. Then IBM acquired FileNet, suddenly ending up with two distinct eForms products. In late 2007, IBM renamed IBM WorkPlace Forms, which is now Lotus Forms. It is still not clear what IBM plans to do with the Shana product they aquired. use for eForms development. The Big Three dominate within the IT departments, so selling into this environment by small players is very difﬁcult. Nonetheless, several companies do thrive today, including Amgraf, Inc. (OneForm Designer Plus and related products), Cerenade (Forms Converter, Forms Designer, Forms Server, Forms Manager, Forms Filler and Forms Output Manager), Cardiff (LiquidOfﬁce), Ringler Informatik, AG (SnapForm), Exstream Software (Dialogue, Dialogue Live), FormSoft Group (Formﬁnder for the Web) and Texcel Systems, Inc. (FormBridge). These companies each offer speciﬁc competencies and features that make their solutions unique. Some of these companies have been around for many years, spanning the entire electronic forms history. Each has speciﬁc strengths and marketing strategies. It should be pointed out that there are no open source forms designer products. All eForms developers begin with their own proprietary designer product. Fitting into the Market Of course, several smaller forms software developers still exist and thrive in the eForms space. Many others have either dropped out or are struggling. Competing with the Big Three creates signiﬁcant challenges. Perhaps the biggest challenge is the propensity for IT to get more involved with software selection, which is then dictated to the forms management department. Large IT departments exercise almost complete control over this software selection, plus they control access to databases, networks and servers for deployment of electronic forms. Most forms management departments have little direct authority over selection of the tools they must www.DOCUMENTmedia.com april.08 document 15 http://www.DOCUMENTmedia.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Document Magazine - April 2008

Document Magazine - April 2008 Contents Editor's View The Research Desk The Response Center BPM: Improving the Way You Process Contributing Writers Mapping Out Performance Build the Context Before You Move into the House of ECM Taking On the Big 3 The Human Connection Addressing Your Addresses Don't Call Us, We'll Call You The Mulitplying Image Recognizing Accuracy New Products Calendar Advertisers

Document Magazine - April 2008

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