We announced on Monday that Appian’s customers in Australia now have more options for their BPM deployments, thanks to our close partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS). The minute AWS turned on its new Service Region in Australia, Appian Cloud was up and running. We were ready right out of the gate because AWS gave our cloud team early access to the environment for pre-testing to ensure Appian Cloud deployments would perform optimally.

This is big news for a region where we have already found tremendous on-premise BPM software demand. With the addition of single-digit millisecond latency to end-users and the ability to store data locally in Australia, we expect our partnership with AWS will help lead an explosion of local Cloud BPM activity.

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Tags: , Amazon Web Services, Australia, BPM in the Cloud, Cloud Computing, worksocial

Earlier this week, DorobekINSIDER host Chris Dorobek spoke with Appian’s VP of Solutions, Evan McDonnell. You can hear the interview on GovLoop. The topic of conversation was how federal CIOs can navigate and make sense of the slew of information technology directives coming at them from the Administration.

The veteran federal technology reporter wanted to discuss the key principles in Evan’s new white paper, “Adapting to the New Information Technology Directives: A Guide for Federal Government CIOs.” As Evan points at the start of the discussion, the directives, starting with former Federal CIO Vivek Kundra’s “25-Point Plan” and continuing through successor Steven VanRoekel’s various “Firsts” initiatives, are all good steps – but keeping track of all of them is a big challenge. Evan wrote the paper to boil things down to their common elements. The result, in Dorobek’s words, is “a 6-part guide to unlocking the secrets of a successful CIO.”

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Tags: , application development, BPM for Government, BPM in the Cloud, dorobekinsider, federal cloud, mobile BPM, Social BPM

“Failure to adapt to the spread of disruptive technologies such as cloud, big data and mobility into every industry sector, and more importantly into society at large, will put companies at risk…[T]he CIO should be a major enabler of innovation for the business and play a central role in operational strategy.”

These words are from the web site for the Ovum Industry Conference 2012 (running Wednesday and Thursday of this week in London). Appian decided to sponsor the event because its focus – the new challenges and opportunities confronting global CIOs – is something we think about every day. Appian’s BPM software is designed to enable the modern CIO to drive greater value from a fractured and changing IT environment.

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Tags: , Appian 6, BPM in the Cloud, CIO, mobile BPM, Ovum, Social BPM

The Federal Government’s poor IT performance is an old story, but it got renewed attention this week because of two new documents.  The first was Federal CIO Steven VanRoekel’s release of his final “Shared First” strategy document which sets guidelines that should lead to better returns on IT investment.  The other event was a memo from Lesley Field, Acting Administrator for Federal Procurement Policy.  Ms. Field laid out steps to make it easier for vendors to provide input and education so government can make smarter technology buys.

So much positive news in the space of a week had me feeling optimistic that we are on a path to stop wasting tax payer money and bring effective IT systems to government.  But my good mood ended when an e-mail hit my inbox with fresh evidence of some of the thinking and behaviors that have caused the Federal government’s IT investments to significantly underperform.

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Tags: , Appian Cloud, BPM for Federal Acquisitions, BPM for Government, BPM in the Cloud, BPM software, Business Process Management, Business Process Management and Government, Process Improvement for Government

The famous German statesman, Otto von Bismark, is credited with saying “Politics is the art of the possible.”  So too goes technology, particularly in insurance.  Lots of things are theoretically possible to do with insurance information systems, if there are no constraints on resources.  Insurance CIOs are never in that position.  In fact, they are in the opposite corner, struggling to maintain legacy systems and still squeeze out some budget for technological innovations that will delight customers and employees.  For them, developing new innovations is “the art of the possible.”  In practice, not much can get accomplished, which is why so many insurers find themselves technologically behind.

That state of affairs is being upended as will be demonstrated at next week’s Appian World conference.

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Tags: , Appian World 2012, BPM for Insurance, BPM in the Cloud, BPM software, Business Process Management, Cloud Computing

Appian is a regular sponsor of CXO Media’s “CIO Perspectives” conference series. At tomorrow’s CIO Perspectives New York, our CEO Matt Calkins will discuss Appian’s vision for BPM software in the modern age of mobility, cloud computing and social business collaboration.

This will be a preview of the keynote presentation Matt will deliver next week at Appian World 2012. Pre-registration for the conference is closing this week, so make sure you sign up.

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Tags: , Appian World 2012, BPM in the Cloud, BPM software, Business Process Management Software, CIO Perspectives, mobile BPM, Social BPM

It’s an exciting time for business process management software. As the technology drives deeper into the mainstream of enterprise IT, it is intersecting with enterprise mobility and social business collaboration efforts. As more BPM projects mature into enterprise-wide process improvement programs, Cloud BPM is offering a new way to scale BPM initiatives. As Big Process meets Big Data, organizations are re-thinking the relationship between the two.

So what does it all mean – and how do you get ready and execute to get the most value? The slate of industry analyst keynote sessions at Appian World 2012 – from Gartner’s Daryl Plummer, Forrester Research’s Clay Richardson, noted BPM expert and Column 2 blogger Sandy Kemsley, and MWD Advisors’ Neil Ward-Dutton – has your answers.

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Tags: , Appian World 2012, BPM in the Cloud, Business Process Management, mobile BPM, Social BPM

Our CEO, Matt Calkins, calls the current state of Business Process Management software offerings “feature-incomplete.” The flurry of BPM technology acquisitions by stack vendors over the last two-plus years may create an attendant assumption that the market has “matured.” While important leaps forward have been made, Appian believes BPM software has yet to reach its true functional potential and organizational value.

The true value of Business Process Management software will not be realized through the improvement of discrete processes. Not even through the holistic and centralized governance of a variety of core processes. BPM software will truly emerge as the best way to organize and execute work when it becomes the single platform, and the single environment for unifying and presenting all the systems, data and collaboration a decision maker needs, in the moment they are needed.

BPM software isn’t there yet, and it’s on-going evolution will not be driven by stack vendors already consumed with sorting out their Frankenstein’s Monster BPM product portfolios. Appian remains exclusively dedicated to pushing the envelope on what BPM software is and what it can do. You can hear more about Appian’s vision, and how the next version of our product will take us all closer to it, by attending Appian World 2012.

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Tags: , Appian Cloud, Appian World 2012, BPM in the Cloud, Business Process Management Software, mobile BPM, Social BPM

Federal procurement practices continue to be a hot topic of discussion as government agencies look for new ways to comply with Obama Administration mandates to reduce waste, deliver projects more quickly, and increase the efficiency and transparency of operations. Many federal procurement teams are turning to BPM software and Appian’s Acquisition Business Management solution to eliminate mountains of paperwork and reach higher levels of performance faster.

Appian is participating in two important federal procurement events in the near future: ACT-IAC Acquisition Excellence 2012 (March 29 in Washington, DC) and the Defense Procurement eBusiness Conference (April 10-12 in Atlanta).

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Tags: , BPM for Federal Acquisitions, BPM for Government, BPM in the Cloud, mobile BPM

Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for…ERP. These monolithic, cumbersome and inflexible systems are not up to the challenges and requirements of the Mobile, Cloud and Social Age. If you have experience dealing with an ERP system – simply using one or, heaven help you, trying to extend one to fit the changing needs of your business and your customers – you already understand the problems. If you don’t, Forrester Research and Forbes Magazine have two quick primers for you.

The question is this: What does the demise of ERP mean for companies that have sunk massive investments into these antiquated beasts? Must they either forsake those investments and even throw good money after bad through massive rip-and-replace efforts, or just continue to suffer and struggle? Thankfully, modern BPM software offers a third way.

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Tags: , BPM in the Cloud, BPM software, Enterprise Resource Planning, ERP, mobile BPM, Social BPM