FileNet Corporation, a provider of Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions, has acquired Shana Corporation, a provider of electronic forms software. This acquisition is expected to provide FileNet with the technology and expertise to address the growing Forms Management market, and will strengthen FileNet’s ECM offerings. Shana’s technical development team will form the core of FileNet’s Canada-based development center and will support further FileNet product development, as well as customer support of FileNet’s eForms offering. The purchase of Shana is an all cash transaction valued at approximately $8.5 million to acquire all stock in Shana Corporation. Based in Edmonton, Canada, Shana is a privately owned corporation that provides electronic forms, or eForms, software. Customers include NASA, Liberty Mutual, Washington State Department of Social and Health Services, General Electric, The Government of British Columbia, and The Boeing Company. FileNet and Shana have been marketing an integrated eForms solution for the past year through an OEM partnership, offering customers a rich, integrated content- and process-centric Forms Management capability. Building on this relationship, FileNet expects that the new capabilities acquired from Shana will allow FileNet to address the complete spectrum of eForms requirements, from general Forms Management and delivery to content and process-centric uses which require a more complex set of features and functions.
FileNet has also announced the availability of Virtual Content Management (VCM) capabilities for its FileNet P8 product line. With VCM, FileNet customers can access and use content stored in third party repositories including Content Management repositories from IBM, Documentum, and Microsoft, among others. Over the past 18 months, FileNet has moved to expand its product portfolio and make selective technology acquisitions to deliver a seamless ECM capability. This past January, the company launched FileNet P8, its ECM architecture that combines content, process, and connectivity capabilities for enabling better decision-making. With FileNet’s VCM capabilities, users can access virtual content through the FileNet P8 Workplace and application development system. FileNet P8 Workplace is the company’s user interface for ECM solutions that enables administrators, business analysts, and end-users to create and manage business content and processes. VCM is available as an option to FileNet’s P8 Business Process Manager, Content Manager and Web Content Manager suites.
