Unicom Focal Point
| Company type | Software |
|---|---|
| Industry | Software, Portfolio Management |
| Predecessor | Focal Point AB |
| Founded | 1997 |
| Founder | Dr. Joachim Karlsson |
| Fate | Acquired by Telelogic (2005), then IBM Rational (2008), then UNICOM Global (2015) |
| Products | Decision support and portfolio management software |
| Parent | UNICOM Global |
| Website | www |
UNICOM Focal Point serves as a decision support and portfolio management solution utilized by businesses and government entities to gather stakeholder input on applications, products, systems, technologies, and concepts. It assists in prioritizing initiatives that maximize business value and oversees roadmaps for deployment, enhancement, or decommissioning. Additionally, the platform facilitates project portfolio oversight by monitoring resources and timelines, while aiding product management through analysis of customer enhancement requests and planning for upcoming product releases.
Overview
UNICOM Focal Point offers capabilities including:
- Support for Scaled agile framework (SAFe) practices to manage the DevOps lifecycle, featuring Kanban boards, portfolio oversight, and integration with Enterprise architecture, change management, and testing tools via Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration (OSLC).
- Application Portfolio Management—assessing existing applications to guide investment or retirement decisions. Gartner’s Enterprise Architecture Magic Quadrant recognizes the combined use of System Architect and Focal Point as leaders in enterprise architecture and application portfolio management.
- IT portfolio management—evaluating organizational systems and applications to inform investment strategies.
- Project Portfolio Management—aggregating high-level information on project benefits, costs, and risks. It supports role-specific workflows and resource allocation with options for detailed integrations.
- Product Delivery Management—monitoring resources and timelines associated with product launches.
- Product management—ranking features by analyzing customer feedback, competitor activities, and market developments. According to a LinkedIn survey, Focal Point ranks among top product management tools.
As a web-based platform, UNICOM Focal Point stores information within PostgreSQL, Oracle Database, or IBM Db2 environments. Users can enter data through a web interface, spreadsheet imports, or REST API connections. The system processes this data to support prioritization and roadmap planning. Its portal enables worldwide stakeholders to contribute input or review evaluations. A workflow engine manages approvals for organizational changes driven by these insights.
Integration capabilities include connections with enterprise analysis solutions such as UNICOM’s System Architect for enterprise architecture and Rational Team Concert for DevOps workflows via REST APIs and OSLC-compliant tools.
History
Focal Point AB was founded by Dr. Joachim Karlsson; the software originated from his doctoral thesis at Linköping University titled “A Systematic Approach for Prioritizing Software Requirements.” The initial release of Focal Point occurred in 1997.
On April 13, 2005, the product was acquired by Telelogic. Subsequently, IBM Rational purchased Telelogic in April 2008. Later, on January 1, 2015, UNICOM Global took ownership of Focal Point.
Features
Focal Point includes support for:
- Scaled agile framework (SAFe) methodologies
- Kanban boards
- Corporate idea capture and prioritization
- Integration with EA, DevOps, Change Management, Testing tools via Open Services for Lifecycle Collaboration
- Data Collection
- Web portal enabling contributions from employees and customers
- Import/export functionality with Excel
- Import from Microsoft Word
- Email import capabilities
- Analytical Methods
- Pairwise comparison—automatically identifies optimal pairs to rank preferences
- Investment analysis
- Financial Planning utilizing Time Grid Attributes
- Visualization Dashboards
- Roadmaps and Gantt charts for scheduling and resource tracking across projects
- Gantt Chart Histograms providing resource usage and cost details over time
- Dependency lines within roadmaps
- Bubble chart (XY chart)
- Stacked XY charts
- Bar chart—illustrates priorities with options for stacked bars and ranking based on positive/negative criteria
- Pie chart
- Radar chart
- Waterfall chart
- Roadmaps and Gantt charts for scheduling and resource tracking across projects
External links
- UNICOM Focal Point official product page
- UNICOM Focal Point video collection
- Managing Application Portfolios using UNICOM Focal Point
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