BERLIN — On the opening day of its user conference here, IFS today announced a new interface for its enterprise applications suite that it said will significantly improve usability and user productivity.
The new interface, called Aurora, was described by IFS officials today as a "rich internet application" that employs a set of new navigation technologies such as adaptable link pages, contextual breadcrumbs, visual recent screens, rich media notes, in-application viewing of Adobe PDF and Microsoft Word documents, and the ability to integrate Web content into work.
"The bland look, feel, and function of enterprise applications in the workplace are no longer acceptable," said IFS chief technology officer Dan Matthews, in a statement. "The developments seen in the consumer sector mean that design in enterprise software is now more important than ever. Employees want the same usability they have in the latest cell phones, iPods, and on the Web, available to them in the office."
Aurora is scheduled to be beta tested with selected customers in March of 2008, IFS said, with general availability slated for the fall, about one year from now. Matthews said at a press conference here today that IFS will develop about 7,000 screens for the interface over the coming months.
In announcing Aurora, IFS joins a growing number of enterprise software companies that are seeking to improve user interfaces, and the overall experience a user has, on what have been complex and difficult-to-use products. By making the user interface more intuitive, more graphical, and hence easier to use, the theory goes, IFS exposes the software to more people in an organization.
Software providers such as SAP, Lawson, and others are attacking these usability problems with new interface designs. SAP's Duet interface, for example, is modeled after the well-known look and feel of Microsoft Office. For its part, Aurora supports the Microsoft .NET development framework.
Analyst reaction to the Aurora announcement was positive. Tim Payne, a research director at Gartner Group based in the U.K., said he was impressed by the user interface and expected it to help IFS drive upgrades to its application suite. He also said that IFS needed to bring out Aurora to keep up with the competition. "To a certain extent, they are playing a little bit of catch-up," Payne said in an interview with Managing Automation.
In discussing the need for an improved interface, IFS today cited independent studies which show that search difficulty and poor navigation around and between applications are two of the biggest drags on user productivity. In August, IFS unveiled enhanced search capabilities in its ERP suite that allow users to pull data from anywhere across the applications. Aurora, which will be provided free to users under maintenance, is likewise designed to alleviate usability issues.
A new version of the IFS application suite, designated 7.5, was introduced on October 11 and will be a prerequisite for the deployment of Aurora. In addition to supporting Aurora, version 7.5 includes what IFS said was extended support for global organizations in the areas of tax, reporting, supply chain, and inventory management; risk management across multiple projects; and certain new functions for product variability.
In an interview, IFS chief executive Alastair Sorbie said that Aurora is designed to attract new customers to IFS as well as retain current customers.
"We needed to regain the appeal of the [IFS application suite], " Sorbie said. "Over the years it has gotten a bit tired. Aurora will improve the salability of the product and encourage existing customers to stay with IFS."
Providing more of what customers want was a recurring theme during the first day of the two-day conference, which has attracted approximately 1,000 IFS users from 39 countries. In his keynote address, and later in the interview, Sorbie stressed that IFS' mission is to listen more closely to what users want, which includes a more responsive IFS that brings new products and upgrades to market faster. And IFS must differentiate itself from such companies as SAP and Oracle, he said.
"We want to get closer to the market than we've been in the past and produce product more quickly," he said. "My vision is of a resilient and agile IFS. We believe we should be a solution of choice."
Sorbie, who became CEO of IFS in March 2005, has presided over a financial turnaround at the company. IFS is now in what he called phase three of its evolution, becoming more resilient and agile and providing controlled and sustainable growth. "IFS is a safe business choice today," he said.
IFS will report is third-quarter financial results this Friday.