Oracle's FSI Product Roadmap

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Oracle releases single-ID products

December 07, 2006 (TechWorld.com) Oracle Corp. has launched a set of products designed to work across all its identity management software, which it says will help companies simplify and improve security.

Along with rivals such as CA Inc., IBM and Hewlett-Packard Co., Oracle sells identity management systems, which are becoming ever more important in an age when companies must comply with complex financial accountability regulations, and a market is expected to be worth $4 billion in the next three years.

Oracle Enterprise Single Sign-On Suite works across all Oracle software, including databases, e-business products, and the PeopleSoft and Siebel applications it has acquired, as well as some non-Oracle applications. It works across mainframe, client-server and web-based applications.

The suite is aimed at the financial services, health care, government and telecommunications industries, as well as any organization with legacy applications and compliance requirements, Oracle said. The goal of the suite, as with emerging single sign-on frameworks such as Higgins, is to keep users from having to remember separate passwords and authentication credentials for each system or application.

Password proliferation is considered a major security risk, since users tend to resort to insecure methods to remember their various log-ins -- such as writing them down or using weak passwords.

The suite comprises five parts, a log-on manager, a password-reset tool, an authentication manager, a provisioning gateway and a kiosk manager, Oracle said. Because of heavy demand for Windows desktop password reset capabilities, the company is also making that part of the suite available on its own.

The suite is part of Oracle Identity Management, other components of which include Identity Manager, Access Manager, Virtual Directory, Internet Directory, Identity Federation and Web Services Manager. It is available immediately in the U.K. and elsewhere, and is priced per user.


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FLEXCUBE Leads Retail Banking Vendors, Says Forrester

i-flex, a provider of IT solutions, has said that i-flex was among the select companies that Forrester Research invited to participate in its November 2006 Forrester wave report, 'The Forrester Wave: Retail Banking Platforms, Q4 2006'. According to the report, i-flex’s FLEXCUBE scored 4.29 the highest for its current offering out of a possible score of five. Weightages were given to parameters such as functional depth and breadth, multi- channel enablement, platform agility and architecture and development.

i-flex and Financial Services Inc. (FSI) had launched FLEXCUBE as a hosted offering to Community banks in the United States mid November 2006.

FSI, a provider of data processing and item processing services to Community banks for more than 50 years, will now offer FLEXCUBE as a hosted solution.

The companies said the joint offering by claiming flexibility, improved efficiency, enhanced agility, better profitability and enhanced customer service.

"Banks are struggling to meet the concurrent challenges of increasing competition, rapidly changing market requirements, increasing regulatory complexity and the constraints imposed by inflexible legacy systems," said George Thomas, VP Customer fulfilment and Solution Architecture. "The combination of the FLEXCUBE platform and FSI's experience in supporting community banks will help banks in this segment achieve competitive advantage."

On the other hand, contrary to expectations, Oracle's acquisition of 55 per cent stake in i-flex Solutions has not yet translated into significant business growth for the latter. However, i-flex Solutions remains optimistic.

I-flex CEO Deepak Ghaisas, said that he saw strong traction coming from the sales team of Oracle.

Oracle had acquired Citigroup's 42.41 per cent stake in i-flex last year and had subsequently increased its stake through open market purchases. At present, Oracle owns around 55 per cent stake in i-flex and has made an open offer for 20 per cent more at Rs 1,475 per share, which has been delayed.

"Oracle hasn't started showing that impact on the core-banking side of the business. But in the case of Reveleus, Oracle has helped us clinch Wachovia Bank as a customer," he said. Reveleus is i-flex's risk management solutions portfolio.

However, South India based SyndicateBank has implemented Core Banking Solution (CBS) in 1001 branches with FLEXCUBE with IBM as the System Integrator and Implementation Partner.

The FLEXCUBE implementation has helped Syndicate Bank introduce several services to its customers such as 24x7 banking services, multi city operations, online fund transfers, online e-ticketing for railways, online utility bill payment and online payment of excise duty and service tax. The Core Banking implementation has also benefited Syndicate Bank by increasing productivity and reducing manpower, thereby enabling redeployment of man power to functions critical to the bank’s business, I-flex representatives said.

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