ANALYST NEWS

IDC report
Increasing need for business rules in W. Europe
More than half of the 98 respondents in a recent survey conducted by International Data Corp. (IDC: www.idc.com) said they would make policy changes more frequently if deployment were simpler and/or cheaper.

The survey of IT decision-makers in Western Europe is the subject of a new IDC report, "Business Agility through Adaptable Rules: The Case for the Business Rule Engine." The study shows old concerns - cutting costs, reducing errors and shortening policy implementation time - weigh more heavily than ever on IT operations in the region. New Business Rule Management Systems like ILOG JRules greatly reduce time to deployment for policies while cutting costs and improving accuracy through the direct involvement of business users. Of the companies surveyed that already had business rule software, 64 percent reported ROI meeting or exceeding expectations.

Also notable among the survey's findings:

• The percentage of organizations intending to automate more than 90 percent of their processes is expected to double to 22 percent over the next two years.
• Increasing the efficiency of business processes was rated highly important by 76 percent of the respondents.

"This puts the automation of business rules into a new light," writes Rob Hailstone, IDC director for European Service-Oriented Architecture and Application Platforms, "the lack of an effective means of automating business rules is proving a constraint on business change in half the organizations we surveyed where a solution has not been implemented."

As business operations become more restricted by regulatory and market pressures, companies increasingly need software solutions that simplify and accelerate the deployment of new policies. For more information on the survey, please visit idcbrm.ilog.com.