Business Objects Offers Integrated Business Intelligence Solutions for IBM Enterprise Information Portal

Business Wire, Dec 14, 2000

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 14, 2000

BusinessObjects(TM) InfoView for IBM EIP Integration Kit Delivers

Fully Integrated e-BI Capabilities to IBM EIP Users

Business Objects (Nasdaq:BOBJ), a leading provider of e-business intelligence (e-BI) solutions, today announced it has delivered BusinessObjects(TM) InfoView for IBM EIP integration kit, a fully integrated solution incorporated within IBM Enterprise Information Portal(1) (EIP). Business Objects is one of the first to integrate with the IBM Enterprise Information Portal to enable IBM portal users to access, analyze, and share e-BI content.

"We are extremely pleased with the capabilities BusinessObjects InfoView brings to IBM Enterprise Information Portal. Our joint customers will be able to complete their business intelligence tasks all from within the IBM EIP portal," said Jim Kelly, vice president, data management marketing, IBM. "Business Objects' ability to quickly execute on this integration has provided the IBM EIP with the structured e-BI content that complements the existing unstructured content capabilities of our product."

"By providing integration with IBM's EIP product, Business Objects and IBM will help customers extend the reach, flexibility, and competitive advantage e-business intelligence brings to an organization," said Mark Tice, group vice president of global alliances for Business Objects. "Working with IBM, our Open Portal Initiative has been a great success."

BusinessObjects InfoView is a Business Intelligence Portal (BIP) that collects and consolidates a company's business intelligence information and presents it in a secure, focused, and personalized view to business users. BusinessObjects InfoView provides users with several benefits including fast data access, personalized access to secure and relevant information, and easy collaboration with colleagues within the enterprise and beyond. As an e-BI content provider to the IBM EIP, InfoView provides these benefits to portal users by giving them the ability to access web based BI functionality and content through an enterprise portal solution.

IBM EIP enables rapid portal application development and deployment by providing a consolidated set of APIs. It reduces the cost of ownership of portal applications by providing a single infrastructure for a variety of portal applications and by managing the variety of interfaces into various data and information sources. IBM EIP also creates higher return on investment in portal technologies by leveraging resources and programming expertise within IBM's customers' environments.

By integrating InfoView within IBM EIP, users will experience the look and feel of a single interface, simplifying navigation and allowing easy access to structured and unstructured data. BusinessObjects InfoView for IBM EIP integration kit will be included in the BusinessObjects Developer Suite as a portal integration kit. Several new capabilities will be accessible to IBM's portal users through InfoView integration, including:

-- Single point sign-on access -- enables users to access e-BI reports and
queries through a one step log process within the IBM EIP

-- Access to Business Objects repository -- users can search for content in the
Business Objects repository via the IBM EIP search mechanism

-- Display reports within IBM EIP framework -- users have the capability to
display reports within the IBM EIP framework

-- Report authoring -- users can also author reports from within the IBM EIP by
launching WebIntelligence(R), a thin-client query, reporting, and analysis
tool, that allows users to easily communicate and share strategic data via
intranets, extranets, and portals

About Business Objects Open Portal Initiative

Business Objects created the Business Objects Open Portal Initiative (OPI) to provide organizations maximum flexibility in deploying portal solutions throughout their enterprises. As the first part of the company's portal strategy, Business Objects provides InfoView that collects and consolidates a company's business intelligence information and presents it in a secure, focused, and personalized view to business users. In addition, Business Objects partners with leading EIP vendors, enabling the rich feature set of Business Objects products to be directly and seamlessly integrated into EIP solutions provided by partners and offering customers a wide array of vendors to choose from as they construct their complete end-to-end portal solution.

About IBM Enterprise Information Portal

The IBM Enterprise Information Portal is based on DB2 Universal Database, the industry's first multimedia, web-ready relational database management system, strong enough to meet the demands of large corporations, and flexible enough to serve medium-sized, and small e-businesses. DB2 Universal Database combines integrated power for business intelligence, content management, enterprise information portals, and e-business with industry-leading performance and reliability to drive the most demanding industry solutions. DB2 Universal Database together with internet technology makes information easily accessible, available, and secure. There are more than 40 million DB2 users from over 300,000 companies worldwide relying on IBM data management solutions. For more information please visit http://www.ibm.com/software/data/. Additional information on the IBM Enterprise Information Portal can be found at http://www.ibm.com/software/eip/.>