PilotFish in the News
ACORD and PilotFish Technology Jointly Announce Agreement to Offer the XCS eiConsole for ACORD License
for FREE to ACORD Members
ACORD Members to Benefit from Integration Solution that Facilitates Implementing ACORD Standards 10x to 100x Faster
(BUSINESS WIRE)—April 7, 2010 - PilotFish Technology is pleased to announce that it has entered into an agreement with ACORD whereby ACORD will offer and distribute PilotFish Technology’s XCS eiConsole for ACORD to its members.
The XCS eiConsole is a graphical Integrated Development Environment for developing, testing, deploying, managing, and maintaining interfaces. Co-branded the “XCS eiConsole for ACORD”, it will offer ACORD members specific capabilities that enable the fastest, highest quality, and most cost effective means of implementing the ACORD XML Standard within their respective organizations.
“We are very excited that PilotFish will provide the XCS eiConsole to our members to facilitate the implementation of the ACORD Standard,” commented Lloyd Chumbley, Vice President Standards, at ACORD. “We have many years of experience working with PilotFish for our own validation, testing and certification and we're glad that our members will be able to benefit from these technologies as well.”
The XCS eiConsole provides enormous value to anyone that has implemented or is implementing the ACORD Standard. XCS eiConsole components include:
- The Validation Processor
- The File Specification Editor
- The Data Mapper
- The Schema Manager
- Integration Testing
The output of each of these components is W3C-compliant which means it can be “plugged in” to any W3C-Compliant SOA/ESB infrastructure.
The XCS eiConsole was originally designed to support insurance and specifically, ACORD requirements. It supports unique features and functions for insurance not available in any other integration tools. These features vastly increase the insurance professional’s productivity and include:
- An on-line tutorial in both video and text format that provides step-by-step instructions for building and testing an ACORD message.
- Pre-built templates for ACORD LAH, and PCS transactions - saving thousands of hours that would be spent reviewing implementation guides and custom defining transactions.
- The ability to submit transactions directly to ACORD’s Testing and Certification Facility (TCF).
- A built-in Validation Processor that supports schema validation, Schematron /XSLT validation, and “Validators” that can check metadata and reference information, perform database lookups and support regular expressions and patterns.
- A File Specification Editor that enables the transformation of Excel spreadsheets (such as DTCC) and flat file definitions (such as AL3) to an XML representation including their associated documentation. No time consuming and tedious custom programming is required.
- An intuitive graphical Data Mapper that provides a “point, click, drag, and drop” method of building complex XSLT transformations. ACORD-specific features of the Data Mapper include:
- Ability to import both the ACORD XSD and ACORD Metadata - eliminating the need to search external sources for documentation necessary for the data mapping process.
- Searchable ACORD Metadata documentation.
- “Drag and drop” mapping of typecodes (Life & Annuity), and Codelists (P&C). Tabular values are automatically imported from the ACORD metadata documentation.
- Point-and-click support for role-based relations.
- Easy upgrade from one release of the ACORD Standard to another with just a few mouse-clicks.
- Ability to export W3C-compliant XSLT transformations.
- A Schema Manager that enables ACORD-compliant model extensions including the ability to add elements, attributes, fields, new types, and ACORD type codes and code lists. It also supports simple point-and-click schema “slicing”.
- An Integration Testing and Emulation capability that lets users build prototype interfaces and test them end-to-end including connectivity to the Source and Target systems. The XCS eiPlatform Emulator built into the XCS eiConsole lets the user simulate running multiple interfaces with complex workflows in production. This is ideal for supporting an Agile/iterative development methodology.
“As ACORD members use the individual components of the XCS eiConsole for ACORD to build, test, and validate interfaces and to manage the ACORD schema, we are confident they will come to appreciate its ease of use and resultant productivity gains,” commented Neil Schappert, president, PilotFish Technology. “When they realize that with just the click of a mouse they can also deploy the developed interfaces to the XCS eiPlatform and run them in production, they will understand the value of having both the XCS eiConsole and the XCS eiPlatform. It will be a win for ACORD, ACORD members, and PilotFish.”
The XCS eiConsole for ACORD, is available on the ACORD website at: http://www.acord.org/standards/implementation/pages/tools.aspx
One free XCS eiConsole for ACORD concurrent use license, is available per member company (subject to the approval of both PilotFish and ACORD).
About PilotFish Technology:
Based in Middletown, CT, PilotFish Technology provides comprehensive software and services to enable the integration of disparate systems using XML Standards. Whether developing simple point-to-point interfaces or a comprehensive Service Oriented Architecture, PilotFish integration tools can help to dramatically shorten project timelines, reduce risk, and improve the quality of deliverables. Over 40 carriers and third party providers to the insurance industry have selected PilotFish Technology integration solutions. Celent, in its most recent Traction Index, ranked PilotFish #6 overall and named PilotFish an Infrastructure Category Leader. In Novarica’s 2009 ACE rankings, PilotFish scored a near perfect 99% for staff, organization, functionality and technology along with overall customer satisfaction.
For more information, contact Monika Vainius, Marketing Director, at 860-632-9900 ext. 303 or visit www.pilotfishtechnology.com |
