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The Power of Cloud and BPM

Cindy Cheng, ​Sr. Director of Marketing Communications, EMEA, Appian
April 23, 2012

Clay Richardson from Forrester Research is a proponent of tackling and structuring big data with big process. In a recent blog post and in his riveting keynote presentation at Appian World 2012, Richardson discussed the four cornerstones to successfully tackle and implement big process across the enterprise by:

    • Transforming the customer experience with mobile and operational processes

    • Embracing and anticipating chaos with dynamic case management

    • Combining and applying the process context to big data to drive transformation

    • Leveraging cloud to accelerate application delivery and minimize risks

Clay Richardson from Forrester at Appian World 2012

Cloud computing, in particular, plays a key role in accelerating thedeployment of enterprise applications and delivering faster time to value to the business. More and more customers are going to the cloud and choosing the Software-as-a-Service model for flexibility, scalability, cost effectiveness, and deployment speed.Yankee Group has found that 41 percent of large enterprises with more than 10,000 employees already deployed or were considering deploying a cloud platform within the next 12 months in 2011, compared to just 32 percent in 2010 (Source).

This number is consistent with Appian's 2011 results, where Appian Cloud BPM represented 37 percent of total customer license orders that year. Here are a few Appian customers who chose cloud to deploy their enterprise applications:

    • European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) implemented four BPM projects using Appian. While the earlier projects were on-premise, EBRD opted for private cloud deployments for more recent implementations due to lower costs, faster deployment speed, easier to maintain, and greater flexibility. Read more about EBRD's BPM projects.

    • Manulife Financial deployed four distinct cloud instances to automate marketing services in Canada with social and mobile features from Appian BPM. The customer indicated that cloud computingis an enabler for BPM success, which made it easier for corporate and contract workers to collaborate and participate in marketing processes. Speed to market and less dependency on IT resources were other sited reasons for cloud adoption. Learn more about Manulife and the Mobile, Cloud, and Social BPM panel at Appian World.

    • IBENOX, an Appian partner,implementedan intelligent and event-driven BPM product application in the cloud that's integrated with geo-location technology for an agricultural manufacturing client. The solution includes weather forecasts, field-based sensory and monitor devices to gather data, trigger business rules as events occur, and dynamically adjust rates and schedules accordingly to minimize production waste and maximize effectiveness. See how IBENOX is using BPM and location intelligence.

Still not sure about putting your valuable business processes and data in the cloud? Appian partners with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to power our cloud infrastructure. As the pioneer and leader in cloud computing, AWS delivers a highly reliable, scalable, and cost-effective infrastructure platform to hundreds of thousands of customers in 190 countries. The AWS Deputy Chief Information Security Officer, CJ Moses, provided an overview of the different levels of security, data privacy control, and extensive certifications awarded to AWS at Appian World 2012. Visit the AWS Security and Compliance Centerto learn more.

Learn more about Appian Cloud andthe benefits to your organization, watch a product video, and request a trial today.

Cindy Cheng

Director of Product Marketing