The Governance Accelerator, which provides the industry's first pre-packaged solution based on the new Portfolio Edge 3.0 platform, includes proven process methodology, business process templates, pre-configured product, and implementation services. This offering enables companies of all sizes to manage and measure the value of IT investments, increase control, reduce risk and implement a straightforward method for rapid deployment and fast payback.

"Increasing regulatory, economic and competitive pressures will drive IT organizations at even the smallest publicly traded companies to have an effective governance process to understand, control, and manage business activities, particularly investments and spending," said Doug Lynn, vice president, Executive Directions at META Group, a leading provider of IT research, advisory services, and strategic consulting. "Project tracking is an incomplete answer -- flexible, customizable portfolio management processes are needed to assess priorities, derive an optimal response, and communicate downstream activities, tasks, etc. This will enable consistent, controlled adherence to increasingly stringent, emerging government regulations."

Portfolio Edge 3.0 and Governance Accelerator

The new version of Portfolio Edge offers unparalleled financial planning capabilities for IT investments, allowing businesses to quickly generate strategic alternatives, while also modeling the impact of real-world decisions. Users can assess investments and projects in relation to resource availability, required funding, forecasted benefits or anticipated savings, all based on the ability to move investments on timelines, re-sequencing, accelerating or delaying key investments for an optimal investment mix. The new Governance Accelerator processes are based on the industry-standard AIM (Audit, Institutionalize, Measure) methodology from Mainstay Partners.

New features in Portfolio Edge 3.0 include improved portfolio planning enhancements such as:

Financial planning capabilities with configurable time-phased attributes, constants and calculations. Support for splitting attributes in multiple categories including CapEx and Operations is also included.

Workflow support for investment lifecycle transitions with acceptance criteria and approval lists.

Dashboard offering the ability to view datasheet information and charts side-by-side.

Pacific Edge's Governance Accelerator is the industry's first pre-packaged solution, including proven process methodology, business process templates, pre-configured product and implementation services. The Governance Accelerator focuses on the areas of investment initiation, selection, prioritization and measurement. By providing a centralized location for all corporate investments, customers can directly control their investment activity, detect and diagnose emerging issues, monitor the performance of key investments and respond with the best decision at the right time. C-level executives have improved revenue opportunity and cost avoidance through better selection processes, which allow them to detect, prevent and control unauthorized spending while also offering faster reaction times to changing market and economic conditions. Portfolio Edge 3.0 and the Governance Accelerator will be available during the third quarter of 2004.

"Many organizations have acquired products to respond to new governance requirements and find themselves trying to mold their company to the product they've selected," said Terry Ross, vice president of marketing at Pacific Edge Software. "Pacific Edge maintains that the only way to integrate technology into a company is to make sure it fits the specific needs of each individual organization. The Governance Accelerator is flexible and configurable, and adapts to an organization's best practices for fast implementation. Coupled with the enhancements in Portfolio Edge 3.0, this governance solution gives corporate executives the vision, control and decision-making processes they need for compliance."

Pacific Edge Enterprise Portfolio Management

Pacific Edge's Enterprise Portfolio Management software solutions focus on providing the capability to manage major investments in Information Technology, new product development and a variety of corporate initiatives via strategic planning and analysis to measure business value.

The company's solutions enable organizations to consider business investment opportunities in terms of their contribution to overall corporate objectives, weighing and balancing risks and rewards, and enabling the rapid adjustment of the portfolio based on performance and changing business needs, much like a fund manager does for financial investments. This makes it possible for companies to make solid decisions that support the organization's long-range strategy, reduce costs by identifying redundant, low value or non-strategic initiatives; increase the return on their enterprise portfolios through improved selection, prioritization, sequencing, and governance of corporate investments; and optimize the use of critical resources by focusing on the most valuable business initiatives.