Author: Nucleus Research Press Release

Shift to server-based integration improves productivity and reduces costs

BOSTON – March 02, 2010 – Nucleus Research analysts examined the deployment of Sterling Integrator from Sterling Commerce at the Boise Cascade manufacturing and distributing company, and found an 83% return on investment (ROI) with a payback of 1.23 years.

Boise Cascade manufactures and distributes engineered wood products, plywood, lumber and particleboard and distributes a broad line of building materials. With a mandate to update its mainframe, the company migrated off of the older IBM system.

The EDI team had been using Gentran from Sterling Commerce successfully for many years for internal integration between systems and external integration with trading partners. It decided to update these processes using a server-based approach. The mainframe system combined the use of integrated internal systems, including homegrown applications and mainframe utilities, with a firewall-compatible external network with trading partners. The complexity of the integrated utilities, limitations to transaction volume and operational costs contributed to the company’s decision to upgrade.

After reviewing six server-based integration offerings, Boise Cascade selected Sterling Integrator for its scalability, functionality and ease–of-use. Boise Cascade’s transition to Sterling Integrator gave the company a comprehensive system that could be operated and maintained by a more easily trained and smaller staff. Key benefits from the solution include improved productivity and reduced costs.

“Boise’s Sterling Commerce deployment was successful because it eliminated system complexity. This enabled productivity improvements for developers and systems administrators. It also reduced internal costs because the EDI team migrated a number of applications off of the mainframe,” said David O’Connell, senior analyst, Nucleus Research.

All Nucleus Research ROI case studies are independent assessments, evaluating the costs and benefits from the IT deployment.

About Nucleus Research

The leading investigative IT research firm, Nucleus Research provides in-depth quantitative analysis that complements traditional qualitative IT research and enables executives to make technology decisions that maximize business returns. For more information, visit NucleusResearch.com.

Financial close process standardized, improving productivity and creating enterprise-wide accounting uniformity

BOSTON – February 23, 2010 – Nucleus Research analysts examined the deployment of IBM Cognos TM1 at Huntsman Corporation, which generated a return on investment (ROI) of 1,060% with a payback in five weeks.

Huntsman Corporation manufactures products for a variety of global industries, including chemicals, plastics, automotive, aviation, textiles, footwear, paints and coatings, construction, technology, agriculture, health care, detergent, personal care, furniture, appliances and packaging. Operating in five segments, the publicly held company employing approximately 12,000 people identified an opportunity to achieve cost reductions while upgrading its systems for compliance with Sarbanes Oxley.

Administrators at Huntsman initially relied on three different deployments for closing monthly, quarterly and annual statements, each requiring different systems for multiple ERP solutions. Analytical tools available from non-IBM reporting vendors were not flexible enough to provide the granularity of financial analysis required. A systems review found the fully automated IBM Cognos TM1, already in use in an existing deployment, was the most functional solution and was implemented enterprise-wide across all accounting workflows.

In using pre-existing accounting software, the full deployment of IBM Cognos TM1 increased reporting visibility and did not require additional accounting staff to achieve Sarbanes Oxley compliance. Audit fees were greatly reduced because all data resided in one deployment and audit reporting became far more rapid. Accountant efficiencies have improved enterprise-wide, eliminating manual workflows, reconciliations and rework during the financial close process and increasing productivity by 50%.

”The Huntsman deployment had a high ROI because it created enterprise-wide uniformity in the financial close. This meant that Sarbanes-Oxley compliance was achieved without adding headcount, accountants became more productive and the annual audit resulted in far fewer billable hours,” said David O’Connell, senior analyst, Nucleus Research.

All Nucleus Research ROI case studies are independent assessments, evaluating the costs and benefits from the IT deployment. The case study is available at www.NucleusResearch.com

About Nucleus Research

Nucleus Research is a global provider of IT research and advisory services that provides CFOs, CIOs and their staffs with the real-world information they need to maximize business returns from their technology investments, including successfully executing their IT deployments and determining the business value of their initiatives. For more information, visit NucleusResearch.com.

Cloud adoption continues while an economic upturn doesn’t translate into job recovery, changes in spending

BOSTON – December 01, 2009 – Nucleus Research announces its Top 10 IT Predictions for 2010. Nucleus analysts have examined the technology industry’s most aggressively growing segments and have forecast the driving economic forces and faltering trends for next year. Nucleus predictions are based on analysis of both vendors and thousands of corporate end-user case studies. Nucleus predicts the following for 2010:

1. The cloud adoption trend will continue, and vendors without real software-as-a-service strategies will be even more challenged to compete.
2. Cloud platforms will allow ISVs to develop, market, and monetize cloud applications at a dramatically faster rate than traditional ISV development.
3. Analytics go mainstream, as the user population expands beyond the traditional base to include marketers, risk managers and call center staff.
4. Structural unemployment cuts of 2009 will not be reversed in 2010 because organizations that have automated processes will not return to manual ones.
5. CRM investment continues in 2010 to help organizations identify and retain profitable customers.
6. More organizations will restrict Facebook and social networking sites that negatively affect productivity while more professional sites, such as LinkedIn, will grow. Twitter falters.
7. As SAP pushes its customers to SAP ERP 6.0 or to pay higher maintenance fees, it opens the door for on-demand ERP solutions and drives a faster decline in SAP revenues.
8. Mobility strategies and budgets will be reviewed in 2010 with netbooks, Blackberries and iPhone apps driving new billing and upgrade models.
9. IT spending is expected to increase slightly in the next year with only moderate upgrades from XP or Vista to Windows 7. Incremental investment will be significant with existing technologies from CRM, ERP and PLM vendors.
10. Despite efforts to monetize online content, consumers will push back on online subscriptions, denying that revenue stream.
11. Bonus: Google moves toward a monopoly, causing skeptics to wonder why neither the EU nor US governments have taken a closer look.

About Nucleus Research

The leading investigative IT research firm, Nucleus Research provides in-depth quantitative analysis that complements traditional qualitative IT research and enables executives to make technology decisions that maximize business returns. For more information, visit NucleusResearch.com.

Business intelligence competency center reduces reporting demands, improves productivity

BOSTON – November 10, 2009 – Nucleus Research analysts examined the deployment of IBM Cognos BI at Martin’s Point Health Care and found a 1,185% return on investment (ROI) with payback in one month.

Martin’s Point Health Care is a not-for-profit regional health care provider operating nine facilities in Maine and New Hampshire. The agency also administers the US Family Health Plan in northern New England and New York, as well as Medicare Advantage health plans and health management services in Maine.

Martin’s Point Health Care needed a more efficient way to make information available to its employees. The company did not have a unified approach to reporting and data publication, plus the updating of reports was labor intensive and costly. The approach to make custom reports for each end-user in support of operational and financial decisions prevented the company from benefiting from better analytics and data management. Martin’s Point Health Care decided to address this issue by realigning the informatics team and building a unified view of the agency’s data and interactive functionality built upon its existing IBM Cognos BI solutions. As a result they built a new Business Intelligence Competency Center (BICC).

The new BICC reduced the costs of report creation and improved the productivity of data users. In selectively fulfilling report requests, Martin’s Point Health Care has reduced report building by 20%. The company has further improved productivity by being able to spend far less time locating and manually analyzing information from various reports and databases.

“This deployment shows how a BICC can leverage existing software investments. The BICC initiated a cultural shift around reporting and persuaded people to better utilize existing end-user driven reporting and analysis tools. As a result, report request volumes decreased significantly and data users became more productive,” said David O’Connell, senior analyst, Nucleus Research.

All Nucleus Research ROI case studies are independent assessments, evaluating the costs and benefits from the IT deployment. The case study is available at www.NucleusResearch.com

About Nucleus Research

Nucleus Research is a global provider of IT research and advisory services that provides CFOs, CIOs and their staffs with the real-world information they need to maximize business returns from their technology investments, including successfully executing their IT deployments and determining the business value of their initiatives. For more information, visit NucleusResearch.com.