July 1997, Volume 3, No. 7 Baan Spins Out a Web Strategy

The Baan Company (Menlo Park, Calif.; http://www.baan.com), a provider of enterprise business software solutions, has introduced the first in a series of Web-enabled software applications for the extended manufacturing enterprise, and announced its strategy for delivering new Web-based solutions for global organizations and their trading partners. Baan's Web strategy includes three components: development of a new Java-based Web user interface for all current Baan applications; addition of new workflow-based capabilities to reflect how the Internet, intranet and extranet impact business processes; and creation of a suite of stand-alone Web solutions that can run against any enterprise resource planning (ERP) suite. The first deliverable in this strategy is a new suite of Web-enabled supply chain functionality, including Web-enabled sales configuration capabilities based on technology from Antalys, a Baan company. Later this year, Baan will leverage new "push" technology, enabling companies within a supply chain to proactively share operational data. Baan intends to extend the capabilities of its solutions throughout the manufacturing value chain by enabling use of the Web to access critical business data, perform business transactions and proactively share information between its customers and their customers and suppliers. As companies share their corporate information with their suppliers, distributors or customers, components of the ERP solution may be accessed by users who are unfamiliar with the individual company's processes and its ERP application. In developing its Web applications, Baan is working closely with customers and partners requiring specific Internet functionality to create software which is intuitive, allowing users to perform tasks without needing to understand the underlying software or business processes. In addition to Web-enabling its complete application suite through a Java-based browser front-end, Baan is creating new workflow-based applications which meet the needs of three types of business communications: business-to-business, business-to-consumer, and business-to-employee. These workflow-enabled applications will leverage push technology to create communications applications which can drive an entire value chain. Baan's Web-based user interface will offer a solution using Secure Socket Layer (SSL), secure HTTP, user authentication and encryption. Baan Web applications will also support a variety of Web server hardware and software, and provide integration with Web browser interfaces, such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft Internet Explorer. A business modeling capability called Dynamic Enterprise Modeling enables users to readily document changes and reconfigure the software to reflect continuous process improvement.

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