Research and Markets: Enterprise Collaboration: Delivering Better Business Results and Outcomes - Now Available

DUBLIN--(Business Wire)--
Research and Markets
(http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/30b129/enterprise_collabo) has
announced the addition of the "Enterprise Collaboration - Delivering Better
Business Results and Outcomes" report to their offering.

The business issues that are forcing IT management to re-evaluate their
information worker strategies are, of course, many and varied; but the
management and exploitation of business social networking and transactive
information (i.e. that associated with specific communities of interest, their
interactions, and their 'products' or output) is, in Butler Group's opinion,
key. Within any given market or economy, business transaction costs always tend
towards a fixed point, and so it then becomes the value-add that a business can
bring to these transactions that makes the difference. Maybe this is better
customer support, faster delivery, or more flexible working; but whatever the
difference, it will undoubtedly be linked with the way an organisation marshals
and focuses its people.

Technology Issues

Collaboration means working with people through 'shared spaces' that may be
Internet service based, enterprise server based, or connected directly by using
peer-to-peer technology. Collaboration means working within and across
locations, such as home(s), hotels, and offices; it also means working across
and within different businesses, organisations, workgroups, and projects; and it
also means working across and between different IT regimes, business processes,
and corporate policies. Enterprise Collaboration systems enable the information
worker to create, find, organise, and share documents and data among all of the
different desktops, devices, servers, and services to which he or she has
access.

However, despite the availability of such a broad range of collaboration
products, the vast majority of user-oriented, ad hoc business processes remain
hampered and ineffective due to one thing: e-mail. Collaborating via e-mail is
something we all do, every day; it has become second nature to us. There are
better ways of collaborating, and the so-called 'Net Generation' is slowly but
surely introducing new models of working as they shun e-mail in favour of more
socially-oriented systems.

Synchronous collaboration features are a fundamental component of the 'new world
of work'. Whether it is Instant Messaging, video conferencing, whiteboarding or
application sharing, moving to a unified communications and collaboration
environment is something that all IT managers should be thinking about. It is
clearly a mistake to think that Enterprise Collaboration is all about
technology, but it is also a mistake to dismiss the technology altogether.
Therefore, selecting and implementing enterprise social software solutions,
next-generation collaboration solutions, and Rich Internet Applications requires
careful thought, consideration, and planning. In particular, adapting
information security and corporate governance policies to fit with the cloud/Web
2.0 delivery model will, in the opinion of Butler Group, prevent many
organisations from going down this path at present.

Butler Group believes that Web 2.0, and advances in collaboration models, are
capable of transforming the work 'place'. Fully-featured mobile phones are now
in common use, and high-speed telecommunication networks provide connectivity to
a large percentage of the mobile workforce. As the cost of using these networks
decreases, so more opportunities will be created for an organisation's mobile
workers. As a result, Butler Group expects that Enterprise Collaboration
solutions will be tuned to mobile form factors rather than the traditional
desktop PC. With high-quality voice, video, and data available almost anywhere,
and with input and output technologies evolving also, the pace of change in the
Enterprise Collaboration market looks set to quicken as we approach the end of
the decade.

The only environment more complicated than the workplace is the 'other place';
i.e. the home, the train, the car, the plane, the hotel, the motel, the customer
office, and the coffee shop. This is where consumeroriented technology comes
alive, and this is why the consumerisation of corporate IT will have a big
effect on the Enterprise Collaboration systems of the future.

Market Issues

The continued evolution of the consumer-oriented Internet, with its Web 2.0
architectures and models, is starting to have an effect on corporate IT. The
last couple of years have seen some organisations experimenting with Web-native
'social software' (such as blogs, wikis, and communities), and so as we move
towards the end of the decade Butler Group believes that we will see established
Enterprise Collaboration vendors - such as IBM and Microsoft - accelerating
their 'Enterprise Web 2.0' solutions, and challenging Web-native vendors such as
Google.

However, the question being considered by many CIOs is whether to stick with the
establishment - i.e. IBM and Microsoft - or to perhaps consider something new
and innovative from the likes of consumer-oriented technology companies - such
as Google.

Although advanced collaboration environments, such as virtual meeting spaces and
the 3D Internet, are currently confined to specialised use-cases, evidence from
the consumer world would suggest that this form of virtual collaboration could
prove extremely useful within the enterprise. IBM and Sun Microsystems (soon to
be part of Oracle) are both investing in this new area of collaboration, and
Cisco and HP are also providing 'hi-resolution' collaborative environments
through the use of video conferencing technology. Butler Group expects this
technology will be deployed much more widely over the next two years as
usability improves and equipment becomes more commodity priced.

Google has finally removed the 'Beta' sticker from its Google Apps Premier
Edition; the company's cloud-based collaboration software. With this offering,
Google is aiming to tap into a growing market for productivity tools that allow
for online collaboration. While Google may be struggling to meet its rivals in
terms of functionality, those organisations seeking a 'good enough' solution
could save a small fortune by moving to the cloud. Existing enterprise vendors -
such as IBM, Microsoft and Adobe - are also readying cloud-based offerings, and
with compatibility and familiarity important considerations for the Enterprise
Collaboration market, Google's attempts to enter this particular sector will not
be easy.

Key Topics Covered:

Section 1: Management Summary

* Management Summary

Section 2: Introduction and Business Perspectives

* Report Introduction and Objectives
* Enterprise Collaboration Past, Present, and Future
* Enterprise Collaboration Drivers and Requirements

Section 3: Reducing Operational Costs Through Enterprise Collaboration

* Reducing the Cost of Information Work
* Increasing Business Efficiency Through 'Smart Work'
* Adapting to a New World Economy

Section 4: Efficient Collaboration with Remote Workers, Partners, and Customers

* Improving Collaboration with External Stakeholders
* Using Collaboration Tools to Enhance Flexible Working
* Mobile Applications

Section 5: The Impact of Web 2.0 and Cloud Computing on Enterprise
Collaboration

* Cloud-based Enterprise Collaboration Solutions
* Extending Collaboration Through Cloud Economics
* Enterprise Collaboration Meets Web 2.0

Section 6: Market Analysis

* Butler Group Enterprise Collaboration Features Matrix
* Butler Group Enterprise Collaboration Decision Matrix
* Enterprise Collaboration Market Analysis

Section 7: Technology Audits

* Adobe Systems - Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro 7
* Cisco - Enterprise Collaboration
* EMC - CenterStage
* Google - Google Apps Premier Edition
* IBM - Enterprise Collaboration
* Microsoft - Enterprise Collaboration
* Novell - Enterprise Collaboration
* Open Text - Collaboration & Community Management
* Oracle - Oracle Beehive 1.5

Section 8: Vendor Profiles

* Alfresco
* Atlassian
* Autonomy
* blueKiwi
* Citrix
* Day Software
* GroveSite
* Huddle
* Jive
* Leverage Software
* NextPage
* ONEsite
* OutStart
* Ramius Corporation
* SocialText
* Telligent
* Traction Software
* Vignette (OpenText)
* WorkLight
* ZOHO

For more information visit
http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/30b129/enterprise_collabo

Source: Butler Group

Research and Markets
Laura Wood, Senior Manager,
press@researchandmarkets.com
U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907
Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

Copyright Business Wire 2009