So while Oracle Openworld has all the ritz and glamour,
Larry and Aerosmith etc….. for the past
few years the most informative event I’ve been attending over this side of the
Atlantic is the Oracle EMEA partner forum, this year held is Utrecht in October 2014.
Although the forum caters for a wider range of products, my
focus as always is EPM the following update will concentrate on the EPM stream. Hope this helps...........
Firstly, 11.1.2.4. is promised for release end of 2014 but
probably late November.
Hyperion Financial Management (
Announced as the biggest release of HFM ever and this is mainly
down to some staggering improvements in performance. They have made ‘under the cover’ improvements
around database integrations and the UI much faster.
The performance improvements are hundreds of times faster in
the testing against 11.1.2.2. Oracle
themselves haven’t tested against 11.1.2.3. because they don’t have enough dot
3 environments live. That is a fairly
damning assessment on 11.1.2.3. Certainly
in my experience, before patch 500, it was a little bit flaky on HFM.
LCM will now include data and process status, not just
metadata – useful for backups.
Everybody was expecting the cloud to be release for HFM, following
Hyperion Planning last year. However,
the next big step for HFM is Exalytics and will be available on from 11.1.2.4.
Financial Data Management Enterprise Edition (
FDM is definitely dead and linked to this, Enterprise
adapters have not been developed for the replacement that is FDMEE so if you
want to continue with Enterprise it’s FDM only on an old version.
FDMEE becomes the product to product tool of choice i.e. HFM
to Planning but drill back is not working yet.
Previous functionality was available with Data Synchronisation but performance has always been slow so this EPMA
is going.
Financial Close Management (
FCM next release three discrete modules (CM, ARM, SDM)
Supplemental Data
Manger (
Used for collating information that is supplementary to the
core financial statements which would be included within HFM. You can pull down and push back up data to
HFM and it has its own database with its own metadata that is separate to
what’s in HFM.
Reporting is via BI Publisher, hmmmmm.
Disclosure Management (DM)
Further investment still being worked but product is on its
way out so I would continue to give a wide berth.
Account Reconciliation Management (ARM)
Successful in the USA, not Europe. Did not discuss any improvements for
11.1.2.4. although I seem to remember some rumours around detailed
reconciliations. Will have to do some
digging……..
Oracle Financial Management Analytics (OFMA)
Previously version was far too rigid and adoption was low,
more features to allow customers to change the dashboards, and includes mail alerts
for key accounts.
It now opens as a tab within HFM now so you can easily tab between
HFM screens
HFM Exalytics
New in 11.1.2.4.!!! Business
case is still around reducing the cost of ownership in IT. Windows and Linux capable but in first release
only Linux supported. You still need to
run Windows for EPMA and DRM so you still need another server.
Financial Reporting
Cloud Service (FRCS)
Brand new cloud based solution for narrative based reporting
and has been developed from scratch i.e. there isn’t already an on premise
solution. Will replace disclosure management but phase 1 does not
include all of the DM functionality.
There’s no IXBRL functionality at the moment but it’s coming – watch out
DM!
The current version only supports Word documents. For editing you check out documents, download
into Word, edit and upload back up. Alternatively
you can log in directly to Smartview MS Word.
You can also work offline.
There is workflow for approval of content, lots of workflow.
Will include Essbase (BSO but with ASO query engine) for
storing and working with data from report packages.
Hyperion Tax
Provisioning (HTP)
Now FDMEE can have HFM as a source so great if you want to
take data out of your main HFM application into Tax Provisioning
application. Aside from that, not many
more features, other than those associated with HFM.
Smartview (SV)
For 11.1.2.4. now has HFM Journal capability in Excel, very
cool!!!!!!!!
More formatting has been made available and you can see the HFM
“Entity Detail Report” now.
Data Relationship Management/Governance (DRM/DRG)
DRG Has now had successful implementations since it was
introduced last year for 11.1.2.3.
New in 11.1.2.4. will be integration with PBCS and the
authorization process will be enabled for the EPM app.
With DRG it will now be possible to initiate new requests
via a file so will facilitate bulk requests for new accounts rather than one at
a time, cool!
Support
11.1.2.x premier support moved from 2015 to 2018
Internet Explorer 11 capability from patches 500 for
11.1.2.2.500 and 11.1.2.3.500. However,
feedback in the room from most partners was that 11 is not the case, and 11 is
very glitchy.
Enterprise Planning
More availability to access the tablet UI interface for
planning. The simplified interface
completely by passes workspace and would be useful for ‘non core’ users. It is very similar to the cloud interface.
Reports in the simple user interface are only available in
11.1.2.3. on snapshots of data which seems prehistoric. 11.1.2.4. provides that reports will be
available dynamically.
On the fly iterative planning using sandboxes is new. This feature allows a version to be copied on
the fly, useful if certain users want to take data out of the system and then
work off line for a while and then push back into the main version. It’s not a full ‘version’, created from the web
form.
Valid member combinations will be automatic based on initial
member selections
Has been some performance improvements around the UI
Planning and
budgeting cloud service (PBCS)
The three client installs are still Smartview, Predictive
Planning add in and Reporting Studio
On line support feedback goes to support and product
management but aside from that the support model is still SR to Oracle support.
FDMEE is still only available in limited format, no
scripting is allowed so straight mapping on and can only be flat files.
In 11.1.2.4. “CAPEX” and “Workforce” standard modules will
be available.
Dashboards and reporting can now be created on the fly from
a grid and better drag and drop on grid
Scheduler and automation new tool– “EPM Automator” allows
importing /exporting of data & metadata, plan refreshes etc…..
11.1.2.4. Oracle are removing constraints around maximum
number of members in dimensions and number of users (used to be 350)
New Admin Console looks simpler
Still no integration with active directory but it is
planned.
