Powering System i

Guest post by Robert Russell, VP, System i development

So much ERP functionality is untapped—not because it isn’t useful or applicable, but because it’s literally untapped or, even worse, unknown. Organizations run myriad applications today. Multiple ERP and extension upgrades often leave employees who don’t have access to those tools unaware of powerful (but not readily apparent) information that could improve their decision making. Infor Workspace changes that by extending a helping hand to access hidden enterprise application data through a common, consumer-grade user interface.

Workspace rolled out in spring 2011 to rave reviews from IT pundits and—more importantly—Infor customers. Soon to be released for System i, Workspace is built on Microsoft SharePoint and blends a common user interface, in-context collaboration, alert management, and business intelligence. Workspace provides a single sign-on to all applications that users can access via SharePoint’s site pages, reaching out to applications on a local server, in the cloud, or at an entirely different site, while presenting data in a consistent (yet customizable) look.

Kevin Prouty, research director for enterprise applications, Aberdeen Group, writes, “As you would expect, customers are very positive about Infor Workspace. Several have stated that its role-based approach to presenting home screens and dashboards will lead to productivity improvements.” Because the Workspace tools are context-aware, they anticipate and adapt to user needs and interests based on the user’s role and business function.

Seamless navigation across Infor’s browser-enabled applications (the vast majority of our offerings) allows Workspace to automatically present your employees with critical data they might not even know they need, motivating staff to tap into important application data typically not on their radar. For example, a customer-service representative takes a call and is immediately alerted (regardless of where the information resides) to a range of customer information, including:

• Location
• Time zone
• Currency preference
• Purchasing history
• Real-time product inventory level for likely purchases
• Optimum pricing options for those goods
• Contact information for, and access to, key internal and supply-chain staff

Workspace is simple to use, easy to understand, and offers your employees chances to learn, ask, suggest, share, and experience information in ways previously unavailable for enterprise applications.

“While there have been consistent interface advancements since business applications were first introduced, Infor Workspace is a completely new approach, says Soma Somasundaram, senior vice president, global product development, Infor. “It’s a step function advancement, designed to revolutionize the way users work with software and each other. No longer will business and social tools be separate. Infor Workspace seamlessly melds them together, making it as easy to interact with coworkers around the world as it is to use the application itself. We call it socializing the enterprise, and believe this kind of new user experience will not only result in dramatically improved employee satisfaction, but will also produce clear, measureable improvements in productivity, performance, and return on investment.”

Infor Workspace is currently available for Infor ERP LN, Infor ERP SyteLine, Infor EAM, Infor FMS SunSystems, and Infor Expense Management. It will soon be released for System i solutions, such as Infor ERP LX, Infor ERP System21, and Infor ERP XA. To help our customers embrace Workspace, we’re providing pre-built migration kits and incorporating the implementation into annual maintenance contracts with no separate licensing fees.

Are you ready to socialize your business?  Tell us, we'd love to hear from you.