Is Enterprise Content Management a Sinking Ship?

In a recent article by CIO contributing author, Mitch De Felice, the question as to whether or not Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solutions are becoming obsolete is raised, suggesting that the technology is quickly becoming irrelevant. Likened to a ship whose hull is taking on water, today’s boom of solution providers who develop inexpensive tools aimed at revolutionizing collaboration, content management, and data analysis, are dragging traditional ECM software into an undertow. De Felice suggests that if the ECM space has a chance at keeping afloat, developers will need to gain competitive advantage by incorporating big data solutions that will allow users unprecedented levels of insight into an IoT-aged influx of information.

“The challenge for ECM vendors is to provide true information insights on unstructured data. In order to thrive and prosper, these vendors will require more than simple indexing, storage and retrieval of content. ECM vendors needs to shift their view from data storage to knowledge management. Holding onto the current capabilities will no longer be viable to stay competitive in a billion dollar ECM market place.”

The ECM industry is staying ahead of this evolving space with recent acquisitions, like that of OpenText’s, Recommind, Inc.— a leading provider of eDiscovery and information analytics. Recommind’s SaaS and managed services solutions deliver insight from unstructured data to help people make better, faster business decisions. OpenText suggested in a recent statement that the company knows exactly how to stay ahead of the data intelligence curve.

“Unlocking the value of Enterprise Information requires finding, analyzing and making sense of these large volumes of information,” said Mark J. Barrenechea, OpenText CEO and CTO. “Recommind information analytics can be used to solve problems at a scale not previously feasible without machine learning and is expected to be a critical component of the OpenText EIM strategy. With its technology, talent and market opportunity, Recommind offers an extraordinary opportunity and we are pleased to welcome them to OpenText.”

Adding to an already impressive portfolio of products and capabilities, large ECM solution providers see the writing on the wall, and are quickly pivoting and bolstering the capabilities and intelligence of traditional ECM products, with next-generation cognitive platforms like OpenText’s, Magellan. This platform integrates visualization, voice, video, search, text, natural language processing, and semantic and numeric engines through an easy to program, affordable and accessible solution.

Though acquisitions help combat the rising tide, ECM solution providers are realizing that features and capabilities alone, might not suffice. Users demand that new technology solutions integrate seamlessly with existing infrastructures. Additionally, the call for ECM solutions to be platform, database, repository and device agnostic can not go unanswered, and will be a determining factor in whether large ECM providers can weather the storm.

Find out more about the future of ECM by visiting our brand new Enterprise Content Management Solutions news, and best practices website. Stay tuned by following us on twitter for updates about the state of ECM and new developments in a changing landscape.

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