Xerox Corporation

Contact:

Tools Used:
IONA's Orbix™, CORBA, PeopleNet.

Description:
Xerox Corporation chose IONA Technologies' Orbix family of products to build Xerox PeopleNet Web, a fully distributed Human Resources - Employee Self-Service system. This PC-based Human Resources Information System (HRIS) gives employees and managers direct access to human resources information stored in databases such as benefits data, training, compensation, HR policies, and much more. The solution is helping Xerox accomplish its objectives of empowering its people, increasing their satisfaction, and boosting their productivity.

Simplifying the process of obtaining and submitting data eliminates extensive administrative support from the human resources professionals. Due to the decline in paper work and bureaucracy, managers and employees are able to make fact-based decisions directly from the information provided to them on the Internet. Expediting this process enables managers, employees, and human resource professionals to be more efficient in their work. The effects of such an interactive database show up on the bottom line by reducing overhead and decreasing manufacturing costs.

Orbix enables Xerox's software to work together by leveraging the existing software system while integrating new technology. The original Xerox PeopleNet is being replaced with Xerox PeopleNet Web a Java-based web client accessing HTML pages and Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) objects. The new client reuses the existing server infrastructure and proven business logic of the original Xerox PeopleNet.

"We chose CORBA as our object-oriented development standard due to its wide acceptance by the development community. CORBA will allow the business logic developed within the PeopleNet system to be reused wherever Personal Data is needed within Xerox," stated James Johnson, Xerox PeopleNet technologist and system architect. "Orbix was chosen because of the stability of the product, the third party support for Orbix, IONA's market leading position, and Orbix's mature Java support."

"We are pleased with the flexibility and scalability Orbix provides," commented Karen Mihara, Xerox PeopleNet Development Manager. "We currently have over 32,000 users on the client/server version of Xerox PeopleNet. We are hoping to move all of these over to the Web version based on OrbixWeb this year and are planning on a total of over 40,000 users by the end of 1998."

"The benefits provided by utilizing Orbix as the core infrastructure for PeopleNet are quite evident," stated Colin Newman, executive vice president of IONA Technologies. "Managers, employees, and human resources professionals are able to work more efficiently and effectively as a result of the 24 hour, 7 days a week, service that PeopleNet provides. We are pleased that Orbix is able to provide a cross-departmental business solution for the organization at large."

Xerox is a global company in the document processing market. Xerox designs, engineers, develops, manufactures, markets and services the widest array of document processing products and systems in the industry. Xerox copiers, duplicators, electronic printers, optical scanners, facsimile machines, networks, digital publishing machines, and related products, software and supplies are marketed in more than 130 countries. For more information about the Document Company Xerox, please visit http://www.xerox.com .