Jim Brown

One-to-One: Oracle Breathes Life into Viewing
July 18, 2008

I had the chance to talk with ... Paul Giaconia about the Oracle AutoVue solution, which was acquired by Oracle as a part of the Agile acquisition. The occasion for the conversation was an overview of their new release known as 19.3. There are a number of new items in AutoVue, but the one that struck me was the fact that Oracle is adding action to viewing technology, adding life to static documents.

What do they Do? 
Note: You won't hurt my feeling if you skip this section if you are familiar with viewing technology
Cimmetry offers viewing technology that allows people to share and collaborate on a broad array of information, from CAD files to office documents, in a neutral viewing environment. For example, an engineer can create a 3D representation of a CAD file and send it to a customer, someone in Purchasing, a potential supplier, etc. without having to worry whether the person has the software to view it. Instead of requiring the underlying tool that created the information (any number of CAD packages, for example), the recipient simply utilizes the viewing software from Oracle. This is an important part of design collaboration, and Cimmetry (now Oracle AutoVue) has been at this for a long time prior to be acquired by Agile and subsequently Oracle.

What's New?
There were a few major themes for the release that we discussed. A quick overview includes:

• Updates for new data formats (a must for this kind of software, including capabilities for Office 2007)
• Enhanced capabilities for viewing electronic designs (from EDA software, important as more and more designs include both mechanical and electrical components)
• Streamlined user interface (simplification, important as more non-Engineers get involved in product development and other product-oriented processes that can now include 3D images)
• Mobile packs to create a bundle of logically connected viewables (for example a project review), including review comments and markups
• PMI data enhancements (incorporating manufacturing data such as tolerances)
• Enhanced support for the construction industry
• The addition of "IntelliStamp" (see below)

How does this add Life to Viewing?
The last item in the list is what struck me. Perhaps it struck me because I am a business process oriented person from my days at Accenture (I still have my "people-process-technology" tattoo from back in the Andersen Consulting years). This AutoVue release adds "IntelliStamp" as they are calling it. It is effectively a virtual approval/signature stamp. The goal is to take review and approval out of the paper realm and into the digital, virtual world. This new status can be used to drive workflows, for example to forward to the next approver via e-mail. The thing that I like about it is that it contains the approval status in the document, and can initiate the next action directly from the viewing environment. 

The approach does not conflict with a PDM/PLM solution, because Oracle is not creating a new workflow engine or trying to own the process in AutoVue. They are just adding an action-oriented trigger to the documents. Those with a solid PLM infrastructure will most likely trigger a workflow in that system, and use the updated status in the document to update the approval status in the PLM solution itself. Alternatively, the user would take those actions in PLM independently. It feels like the right balance of adding action to the document, but not going so far as to interfere with the solutions that are already in place trying to manage the process.

One Last Point
One final note, is that AutoVue does not need to be limited to PLM or Agile solutions within Oracle. Based on my conversations it is clear that they are exploring a number of opportunities to leverage the technology throughout the Oracle Business Suite. A nice thought when you consider that the lifecycle of a product should be integrated across PLM, ERP, SCM, CRM, and a host of other solution areas. Oracle is clearly looking in that direction.

So that's what I hear from Oracle AutoVue. I hope you found it useful. What do you think? What else should I have asked them?

Posted by Jim Brown on July 18, 2008 | Comments (0)