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IMPORTANT NOTE: All information represents current plans and direction, and is subject to change without notice.
General Information
What is "Atlantic"?
"Atlantic" is the code name for a planned, future software product from IBM® and SAP. This new solution, if and when delivered, would add significant value to our joint customers by providing relevant information to make more timely business decisions. All types of employees would be able to benefit from increased business analysis and information, including infrequent users who could help reduce lost time by providing a means of accessing SAP information via the familiar IBM Lotus Notes® user interface.
This solution would provide the capability to configure and customize each user's unique SAP environment, then present the SAP system options to the user specific to their role and license rights. In addition, the customer would be able to take advantage of the single sign-on capability in Lotus Notes software.
When are plans for this offering being announced?
A planned announcement is scheduled for Lotusphere, 2008.
When will the product be available?
It is currently planned for future availability.
Which company is developing this solution?
It is a joint development effort between IBM Lotus® and SAP.
Sales
What is the price?
At this time, proposed pricing is not available.
Product
What functionality is planned to be include?
Currently planned for inclusion in the first release are workflows, reporting and analytics, a set of user scenarios, and an ability to integrate and extend composite application structure provided in Lotus Notes and IBM Lotus Domino® software. "Atlantic" would allow customers to bring SAP business processes and use of roles into Lotus Notes, and Lotus Notes will provide additional collaborative value to the solution. "Atlantic" would also support the ability for customers to use Lotus Notes both online and offline.
What are the projected business benefits to the customers?
- Immediate business value- Integrates collaborative capabilities with business processes and workflows
- Facilitate improved decision making and minimum end-user training costs- by leveraging the familiar Lotus Notes user interface to introduce new capabilities, helping to lead to a higher degree of business process automation across the organization
- Rapid deployment- Would install easily on existing SAP systems and Lotus Notes and Domino software
Target Market
What type of company would buy this product?
The customers who could take immediate advantage of this solution are those that are joint IBM and SAP customers already running Lotus Notes/Domino SAP Business Suite.
Who would use this solution?
This solution would be applicable to all employees ranging from sales and marketing, to management, to the general employee who has a need for self-service applications.
Services
Would this solution require services?
In general this solution would require services. The installation of the product would be straightforward, but if there is customization work done on the SAP backend, a level of services would most likely be required.
Who could provide services?
It is planned that IBM Global Business Services will be enabled and available to perform services upon product shipment. We intend to help enable the SAP practitioners of the other global system integrators during 2008. We anticipate additional regional System Integrators and System Integrators would also be able to provide services as the need grows.
What is Notes access for SAP solutions? (NaSs)
Notes® access for SAP solutions was introduced as a new feature of Lotus Notes 7 software. This feature integrates Notes with the SAP business application (R/3 v4.6c). It provides a set of scenarios to be used in your familiar, security-rich Lotus Notes 6.5.x or 7.x client at no additional charge - online or offline. It allows end users to access both data and business processes from SAP applications, but adds in rich client capabilities, such as security, replication, "look and feel", application development and data integration.
There are seven integration capabilities including:
- Vacation/leave request-Employees can request vacation or leave time from their manager using the Lotus Notes calendar and e-mail, and the approved time is recorded in SAP applications.
- Time reporting - Employees can report billable time to SAP applications directly from the Lotus Notes calendar.
- Contact management - Employees can look up contact information from the SAP HR and CRM systems, and add it to their personal contacts database.
- Report generation - Employees can schedule or run a report from SAP applications using Lotus Notes.
- Workflow integration - Employees can review and process SAP workflow items using Lotus Notes.
- Employee/manager self-service - Employees can update HR information, such as names, addresses and telephone numbers, using Lotus Notes.
- Meeting scheduling - Employees who use SAP can track the meetings that they schedule using SAP CRM on the Lotus Notes calendar.
Why does "Atlantic" have fewer scenarios planned than the existing NaSs?
"Atlantic" is being developed to allow customers to adapt to their existing SAP environment. The initial capability of "Atlantic" is planned to include some of the NaSs scenarios, but also add the ability to customize the existing SAP environment and add scenarios, if required. Future updates to "Atlantic" are being planned, and additional capabilities would be added based on customer demand.
What is the future of NaSs?
Notes access for SAP solutions is currently supported in Lotus Notes 7.x and Lotus Notes 6.5.x software. It will not be supported in Lotus Notes 8 software beyond. There are no migration tools available. As customers upgrade to version 8 and beyond, they should use the "Atlantic" solution.
What should a customer do who has implemented NaSs?
IBM recommends that when customers upgrade to Lotus Notes 8 and beyond they consider deploying "Atlantic" when available. It is not planned that NaSs will be ported to "Atlantic".
Requirements
What is the plan for software required to run "Atlantic"?
Currently planned requirements:
- Lotus Notes 8.0.1+
- Lotus Domino 8.0.1 +
- SAP Business Suite with ERP 6.0 and BI 7.0
Note: Requirements are subject to change.
Additional Information
Where can I go to get more information?
Visit the website here.
What is IBM Lotus Workforce Management software?
IBM Lotus Workforce Management software is a self-service accelerator for IBM WebSphere® Portal software that helps improve employee productivity/performance by streamlining employee/manager HR-related activities. This solution can accelerate the development of HR self-service portals, provide an intuitive user interface that guides employees and managers to access to SAP and non-SAP information. | 
