Laserfiche Rio, the Latest in Content Management

By Barb Mosher | Published Aug 11, 2008

You know them for their document management and records management systems, but today Laserfiche has moved a step further into the world of enterprise content management with the announcement of Laserfiche Rio, a combination of their enterprise document management software and business process management software.

Laserfiche says Rio is the enterprise content management solution you've been looking for. And guess what? — It integrates with SharePoint.

According to TMCnet.com, Laseriche CEO, Nien-Ling Wacker says the ECM industry has too many complex, difficult use systems, many which have been “cobbled” together from different products. He says their Rio solution “transcends product boundaries to unite document management, business process management and transparent records management in a single enterprise solution.”

Not sure if this solution offering is any less complex when looking at the System Diagram below:

Laserfiche Rio Features

The Rio solution includes modules for information management, document imagings, DoD-certified records management, bpm, system activity monitoring and Web publishing all within a single, centrally management environment.

Not all the modules come standard with Rio. You can have a look at all the features on their website. What you get out the box includes:

Laserfiche Client
Scanning
Snapshot
E-mail Plug-in
Audit Trail
Workflow
Web Access

If you want the DoD 5015.2-certified Laserfiche Records Management Edition and/or Laserfiche Server for Oracle, then you have to pay extra.

Additional Laserfiche add-on modules include: PLUS, Quick Fields, Import Agent and Integrator's Toolkit.

The Rio solution is Microsoft .Net based and utilizes Microsoft standards tools and frameworks such as the .net framework, WWF — Windows Workflow Foundation and MMC snap-ins for administration functions.

Integration with SharePoint

It's unlikely that many Microsoft-based ECM solutions today would come out without some kind of SharePoint integration. In Rio's case, there are a number of integration points:

Web Parts
Records Center Integration
Integrated Search
Workflow Activities

Laserfiche Rio Licensing

Laserfiche Rio has been designed for organizations that have more than 100 users. Licensing is on a named-user basis ranging from US $100 - US$700 per user and there no limit to the number of Laserfiche servers used. It's a tiered licensing model, so the more users you have, the better the license costs get.

In addition, Rio has Public Portal Licensing option that includes unlimited read connections through Lasefiche WebLink.

So we have another enterprise content management system to add to the growing list of solutions offered on the market today. Time will tell if it's what the market is craving in terms of simplicity and feature set — but it does appear to have the makings of a viable alternative.