News

Rally Announces Agile ALM Platform

• By David Ramel
• June 14, 2010

Rally Software last week announced an Agile application lifecycle management (ALM) platform that features a feedback Web site designed to help companies turn feature requests into new products.

The site, called the Rally Idea Manager, is described by the company as an "idea management" tool incorporated into the new Rally Unlimited Edition, the company's new platform that "helps businesses bring products to market at least 50 percent faster and at 25 percent less cost than industry averages," according to a news release.

Developed by Brightidea Inc., the Idea Manager lets customer submit ideas and vote them up and down, similar to the way many social media and other Web sites operate. They can also add their own comments to the ideas.

The site "makes it easy for companies to solicit customer feature requests, discuss and rank them, and migrate them into Rally as user stories, where product managers can communicate delivery progress to user communities," the company said. The feedback Web sites have different levels of access including private, by invitation only or public.

Other features of the Unlimited Edition include new or enhanced capabilities to improve software quality through earlier testing, track project costs and enable easier enterprise-wide Agile adoption, the company said.

The Unlimited Edition is the high-end version of the company's three ALM offerings. It costs $49 per user per month, a step up from the $35 Enterprise Edition. It's available for a free 30-day trial.

Rally, which was recently touted as having the best combination of Agile management tools and strategic outlook among major vendors by independent research firm Forrester Research, also offers a free community edition with user and project limitations.