PARTNERSHIP TO HELP COMMUNICATion ACROSS SYSTEMSWhitehill Technologies, a Moncton, New Brunswick-based provider of document composition and data transformation, formed an OEM reseller partnership with Computer Associates International Inc. (CA), an Islandia, N.Y., software management company. Selected Whitehill products will be available through the CA sales and distribution network. Integration of the company's solutions is designed to improve customers' ability to communicate, regardless of existing systems or application limitations, and to help customers unlock and reuse information already stored in CA's enterprise report management repositories. Under the agreement, CA will be reselling and distributing Whitehill's xml-Transport, Transform Suite, Gateway, and Layout Designer products.
IBM DONATES BUSINESS-PROCESS MODELS TO ACORD
IBM Corp. donated more than 100 business-process models, model definitions and other industry content to the Pearl River, N.Y.-based nonprofit insurance standards organization ACORD. The models, from IBM's Insurance Application Architecture, are meant to accelerate the development and adoption of business-process standards. IBM, Armonk, N.Y., will work closely with ACORD to help integrate the industry content into the existing ACORD standards, and ACORD will issue implementation guides and tools to help the industry use the framework.
CSC STREAMLINES DOCUMENT CREATION AND DELIVERY
Content processing services provider Document Sciences Corp., Carlsbad, Calif., is integrating the policy and forms creation and delivery capabilities of its xPression software with nbAccelerator and CyberLife, the new-business and risk assessment system and the administrative processing software from Computer Sciences Corporation, El Segundo, Calif. The cooperative marketing agreement is designed to help CSC's life insurance and annuity clients ease compliance and streamline the creation and delivery of policies, contracts, claims correspondence and other documents.
BUSINESS RULES-BASED SYSTEMS TO IMPROVE EFFICIENCY
Kanbay International Inc., a Rosemont, Ill., IT services firm, has formed a partnership with ILOG, a Mountain View, Calif., provider of enterprise-class software components and services. Kanbay will use its understanding of the financial services industry to help ILOG market and integrate the business rules management product ILOG Jrules into financial services systems, and ILOG will train Kanbay associates on ILOG Jrules.
MITCHELL ACQUIRES CLAIMS SOFTWARE PROVIDER CLAIMIQ
Mitchell International, a San Diego-based provider of information and workflow solutions to the automotive insurance and collision repair industries, acquired San Francisco-based ClaimIQ, a claims decision optimization applications provider. ClaimIQ will join as a business unit of Mitchell's medical division. The two companies will produce a set of integrated products combining decision support, bill review and collision estimating, and will continue to support both Mitchell's and ClaimIQ's current product lines.
PITNEY BOWES ACQUISITION EXPANDS DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT
Mail and document management systems provider Pitney Bowes Inc. Stamford, Conn., will acquire all remaining shares of Firstlogic Inc., a La Crosse, Wis.-based data quality, mailing efficiency and postal automation software provider. Firstlogic will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Pitney Bowes within its document messaging technologies area. The acquisition is an effort by Pitney Bowes to expand offerings and take advantage of Firstlogic's relationships with system integrators and enterprise software vendors.
MICROSOFT ALLIANCE TO EXPAND INFLUENCE IN INSURANCE INDUSTRY
Vancouver-based Pivotal Corp., a customer relationship management solutions provider, and the CRM division of CDC Software, Hong Kong, expanded its strategic alliance with Microsoft Corp., Redmond, Wash., with the goal of increasing adoption of Microsoft and Pivotal technologies in the manufacturing, financial services and healthcare insurance markets. They are working on co-development, co-selling and co-marketing strategies to raise awareness of Microsoft .NET technologies outside of North America. Pivotal CRM solutions will be optimized to bring customers increased performance of .NET technologies.
WEB-BASED WORKFLOW PORTAL FOR LIFE INSURANCE
Information management systems and service provider Fiserv Inc., Brookfield, Wis., acquired VerticalPoint Inc, a Colorado Springs, Colo.-based provider of underwriting software for the life and health insurance market. The acquisition is designed to allow Fiserv's Insurance Solutions Group to offer a Web-based new-business workflow portal solution to life insurance carriers. Fiserv will integrate VerticalPoint's LifeSuite automated underwriting system within its life-based insurance systems.
DOCUMENT PROCESSING PARTNERSHIP EXTENDED
Ontario-based companies Open Text Corp., an enterprise content management software provider, and InSystems Corp., a provider of document and compliance automation for insurance and financial companies, are extending their partnership to create document processing and compliance solutions. The companies will further integrate Open Text's Livelink ECM Solutions with InSystems' document and compliance automation solutions.
FILENET ACQUIRES COMPLIANCE SOLUTIONS PROVIDER
FileNet Corp., a Costa Mesa, Calif. provider of enterprise content and business process management solutions, will acquire Vancouver-based Yaletown Technology Group Inc., a provider of content compliance software and integrated solutions, for approximately $11 million. The acquisition is designed to provide FileNet with additional compliance technology.
