DM Sep-Oct 2023

Dm INTERVIEW: HYLAND
The value of experience
DM magazine editor David Tyler caught up with Hyland's VP for EMEA and APAC, Tim
Hood, at the company's Hyland Summit event in London
David Tyler: At previous Hyland
Summit events there has been
almost a recurring theme of where
the company has got to in terms of the
many acquisitions over recent years - this
year I'd say the feeling is far more of an
established and settled product portfolio,
and users who are perhaps coming to the
end of that 'transitional' period.
Tim Hood: It's interesting that you say it
feels like we've made that progression,
because it was certainly more of a
journey than we'd expected. Now I'd
say we are seeing a culmination of
some of the reasons that we made
those acquisitions: the customers, the
partners, the market share, the
technology offerings themselves
obviously. But we recognised that
some of our actual technology
development needed to be 'sped
up', so we did invest to make sure
that could happen, and we're seeing
the results of that this year.
The other interesting aspect is that with
our newest announcements today, of
Hyland Experience Automate and Hyland
Experience Insight, it is perhaps the first
time that we're talking to Alfresco,
Nuxeo and OnBase customers
about something that will be
available to all of them, via
REST APIs, throughout
2024. Both products are
in fact relatively mature at
their heart: the
technology underpinning
them came from Alfresco
and Nuxeo. We have
redeveloped and
positioned them as part
of the Hyland suite of
services - and it is worth
noting that they will only be available as a
service, there is no on-premise option.
There are two reasons for that: firstly,
because it feels like that is definitely the way
the whole market is going, of course. But
secondly we were able to say that, because
this is a service that can be called, it can be
applicable to all of our customers. And the
reaction we've been hearing today during
the event from users and partners has been
incredibly positive.
DT: The new products certainly seem to be
generating a lot of buzz among attendees
at the Summit. What is it that customers are
asking for from Hyland in 2023 and how do
the Experience offerings address those
requirements?
TH: From conversations we're having, it's
clear that a lot of customers are looking at
AI use cases: how can we use these
technologies to make our workflows
faster/smarter, and how can we add value
to our content. Several large Digital Asset
Management companies are already using
Hyland Experience Insight to identify
common themes across existing assets, in
order to reduce the need to rework
content, and to cut down on having to
create new advertising materials and the
like.
It feels like we are on the cusp of moving
away from the situation you described
earlier, which was essentially: 'Okay, we've
got all these different platforms - what
happens next?'. The Hyland Experience
platform is the future of the organisation.
There will be further services released,
obviously, and there will also be a repository.
DT: One of the speakers earlier was talking
about how customers are almost begging
them not to make them migrate systems
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September/October 2023
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