M-Files 2018 Introduces Intelligent Metadata Layer
M-Files, which provides an information management platform, has announced M-Files 2018, featuring a new Intelligent Metadata Layer that enables users to access documents and other information regardless of the system in which they are stored.
According to M-Files, the amount of information companies must manage is exploding, while demands related to compliance and the need to automate and simplify are increasing. Legacy enterprise content management (ECM) systems and other traditional approaches to managing information aren't working. Companies are struggling to effectively manage documents and other information stored across "information silos," and as a result, employees can't quickly find the information they need to do their jobs.
M-Files 2018 and its Intelligent Metadata Layer are aimed at delivering a simple, unified experience for intelligently finding, accessing and managing information residing within any system, without disturbing existing processes and the users that depend on them. This also eliminates the need for complex and expensive migration projects, two major stumbling blocks to innovation and business process improvement.
M-Files 2018 signifies the end of the myth that “all content must reside in one system,” said Miika Mäkitalo, CEO at M-Files, noting that M-Files’ vision has always been that it doesn’t really matter where information is stored. What's important is the actual information itself, as well as what it's related to and the context that makes it relevant.
The Intelligent Metadata Layer supports connectors to external systems. Once a connector to an external system is installed, information residing within that system is immediately available directly via the M-Files mobile app, the M-Files desktop application and web access. Users can search and browse without migrating data and without impacting users of the connected system. Information residing in external systems can also be enriched with metadata, which enables M-Files to establish relevance and context when searching for information across existing business systems. For instance, documents in a network folder or SharePoint can be classified by type (e.g., a contract or proposal) and related to other important business objects, such as a customer account in Salesforce or a project or case in an ERP system. This provides an entirely new and dynamic contextual view of the information while leaving it in place and fully accessible to users that don't have M-Files.
M-Files 2018 with the Intelligent Metadata Layer provides an open architecture for developing connectors to essentially any external system, allowing the ecosystem of M-Files partners and customers to also develop additional connectors. M-Files will also release new connectors on an ongoing basis, such as Google Drive and Microsoft Exchange, which will be available soon.
M-Files 2018 also incorporates artificial intelligence (AI) technology to assist users by automatically analyzing, classifying, and tagging documents and other information. A key aspect of this is establishing relationships with objects in other systems, such as relating a document to a customer, project or case managed in a CRM, ERP or HR system.
The use of AI in M-Files 2018 enables automated classification and metadata suggestions by examining documents and other unstructured content using text analytics, natural language processing (NLP), natural language understanding (NLU) and image analysis. M-Files 2018 includes patent-pending AI technologies developed internally by M-Files, as well as an open architecture for AI services provided by third parties, such as Microsoft, Google, ABBYY and others, to ensure access to new technologies and innovations as they become available.
A complete list of new features and capabilities in M-Files 2018 is available.