Business Objects Expands Operations Intelligence Analytic Application.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 28, 2002

Announces BusinessObjects(TM) Workforce Analytics to Provide

Enterprise View of Employee Resources and Costs

Business Objects (Nasdaq:BOBJ), the world's leading provider of business intelligence (BI) solutions, today announced the expansion of BusinessObjects(TM) Operations Intelligence, its analytic application that enables organizations to monitor, interpret, and act on critical business operations including finance and human resources (HR). Operations Intelligence is composed of a series of modules that enable users to gain insight into their revenue cycles and HR processes, which leads to streamlined operations and improved operational efficiency.

The new module announced today is BusinessObjects Workforce Analytics, which allows organizations to optimize recruitment, retain and develop employees, and maximize workforce results. Workforce Analytics enables executives, HR managers, department heads, and training directors to gain a complete view of employee resources and costs across all departments by analyzing recruitment needs, training opportunities, and overall HR costs, specifically organization charts, hire cycle time, benefit utilization and cost, and potential employee turnover.

With this information, organizations can streamline HR performance, improve performance measurement, and increase organization effectiveness. Moreover, as a module in the BusinessObjects Analytics suite of integrated enterprise analytic applications, Workforce Analytics provides insight into how HR key performance indicators contribute to overall corporate performance.

"BusinessObjects Workforce Analytics will help Sanoma Magazines Belgium optimize employee satisfaction and overall company objectives," said Olivier Paijens, software development manager, Sanoma Magazines Belgium. "Workforce Analytics enables us to make better decisions, enhance employee morale, improve employee efficiency and productivity. It gives us a better understanding of training needs and impact, allows us to place employees where their skill sets are best matched to strategic objectives, follow employee development over time, and identify strengths and weaknesses so we can train where needed."

Workforce Analytics provides insight into present and future recruiting needs, reduces hire cycle time, and measures recruiting efficiency. Users can analyze the hire cycle to detect peak and down seasons, do a skills gap analysis to compare available skills with upcoming requirements, and measure the effectiveness of the HR department. For example, what is the average time to fill an open headcount, and am I sourcing appropriately qualified candidates? This means that organizations can maintain accurate hiring and training plans while optimizing HR performance and costs.

In addition, Workforce Analytics can assist an organization in retaining and developing employees, avoiding the skill loss and potential customer dissatisfaction that occurs with employee turnover. Workforce Analytics provides skill and tenure analysis and forecasting that enables users to understand the factors that cause employees to leave, identify the employees at risk of leaving, as well as plan for current and future development needs, such as creating a training plan to aid in employee retention. A user can analyze HR programs such as benefits to determine if its compensation meets industry standards and see which benefits are used by employee segment.

Workforce Analytics helps maximize workforce results by enabling users to get a complete picture of its employees, from performance, to training, to costs. Managers can analyze employee performance, training effectiveness, and employment costs by focusing on salary analysis by employee, by department, by company, benefits analysis, vacation day liability. For example, users can understand which training courses have the greatest impact on employee skill levels, and see how training needs change over time. In addition, Workforce Analytics lets users drill through the organization to view employment costs.

For example, a leading consumer electronics manufacturer could learn the effectiveness of its recruitment process including cost to hire, recruitment cycle, and time used to fill open head counts. In addition, the human resources manager for the manufacturer would be able to learn if the employees interviewed have skills that are in alignment with present and future needs. The training director could monitor the performance of key employees, effectiveness of future training programs, as well how to retain and develop employees.

"An organization's employees are its most valuable asset and a company needs to know if they are getting the best return on that investment," said Gene Villeneuve, director of analytic applications product marketing at Business Objects. "BusinessObjects Workforce Analytics can help by providing a best-practice analysis of hiring, training, benefits, and performance. This gives organizations a complete view of employee resources and costs across all areas of the business and aids organization in aligning HR strategies with corporate strategies."

BusinessObjects Workforce Analytics is for use by all organizations, however customers of SAP and PeopleSoft will benefit from the packaged data integration for SAP and PeopleSoft included with the module. This will accelerate the time to deployment, allow customers to leverage the best of breed capabilities in BusinessObjects Data Integrator, and provide customers with a completely integrated end-to-end business intelligence solution.

Workforce Analytics is part of BusinessObjects Analytics, an integrated suite of enterprise analytic applications that provide analysis of an organization's customers, products and services, supply chain, and operations.

Platforms and Availability

BusinessObjects Workforce Analytics is generally available on Windows NT and Windows 2000.

About Business Objects

Business Objects is the world's leading provider of business intelligence (BI) solutions. Business intelligence lets organizations access, analyze, and share information internally with employees and externally with customers, suppliers, and partners. It helps organizations improve operational efficiency, build profitable customer relationships, and develop differentiated product offerings.

The company's products include data integration tools, the industry's leading integrated business intelligence platform, and a suite of enterprise analytic applications. Business Objects is the first to offer a complete BI solution that is composed of best-of-breed components, giving organizations the means to deploy end-to-end BI to the enterprise, from data extraction to analytic applications.

Business Objects has more than 16,000 customers in over 80 countries. The company's stock is publicly traded under the ticker symbols NASDAQ: BOBJ and Euronext Paris (Euroclear code 12074). It is included in the SBF 120 and IT CAC 50 French stock market indexes. Business Objects can be reached at 408/953-6000 and www.businessobjects.com.

Note to Editors: BusinessObjects is a registered trademark of Business Objects S.A. in the United States and/or other countries. Other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.

Business Objects product inquiries should contact 800/527-0580.