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IBM Implements Electronic Filing at the BA; Germany's Federal Employment Agency (Bundesagentur fur Arbeit/ BA) awards contract to IBM / Swifter processing benefits applicants(M2 PressWIRE Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) DUSSELDORF, Germany and NUREMBERG, Germany -- IBM (NYSE: IBM ) today announced that it has signed a new services agreement with Germany's Federal Employment Agency, Bundesagentur fur Arbeit (BA) to help the agency file, distribute, process and manage documents electronically. Under terms of the agreement, IBM Global Business Services will implement IBM's FileNetP8 enterprise content management platform in which a customized user interface will be developed for the BA. The project, stated to take up two years, is a part of the e-government strategy pursued by the BA with a view to further improving its performance. The aim is to achieve transparent and multi-client capable filing, distribution, processing and management of electronic documents and files. 'With the e-file system we aim to achieve several objectives simultaneously -- to reduce our processing times significantly to the benefit of our customers, to boost overall system transparency, and thereby to make the BA generally more efficient,' said the Federal Employment Agency's Rainer Wrobel, project leader. Mountains of paper files, which have to be transported at great expense, are still very much a part of the day-to-day workload at the Federal Employment Agency. In contrast to processing paper files, electronic documents and files can be accessed immediately and simultaneously by authorized employees, thereby improving substantially the ability of Agency offices to provide information. By using a uniform document management system solution, the time it takes to deal with individual applications and transactions can be reduced significantly and a higher overall degree of transparency can be achieved. The system is based on IBM's FileNet P8 enterprise content management platform. The platform provides a unified content, process and compliance environment for managing documents and controlling workflows. It features uniform, standardized interfaces for all specialized IT applications and thereby provides the technical and organizational link for digital document management and processing. 'This agreement builds on IBM's long-term work with the Federal Employment Agency and will help them develop smarter ways of managing information,' said Axel Bindewalt, Industry Leader Social Security IBM Global Business Services, Germany. 'IBM works with public sector clients worldwide and its deep knowledge in the amount of data involved in agencies like the BA, has enabled us to develop and implement smarter solutions that save time, reduce costs and increase productivity.' Once the rollout is completed, which is likely to be in 2012, a total of around 50,000 users will have access to the platform. The contract with IBM was signed in March 2009. ((Comments on this story may be sent to [email protected])) (c) 2009 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD |