Box bought Crooze<\/a>, a small company that specializes in workflow automation and metadata management with integrations into Box, making it a logical acquisition target. Being able to manage metadata is central to a lot of automation in content management because it provides a way for the software to identify and understand the type of content when there is no other structure present. That can help move different content types \u2014 whether documents, video, images or audio \u2014 through automated workflows and reduce a lot of monotonous tasks previously handled by bored and annoyed humans.<\/p>\nBut what Box is doing with Crooze and generative AI may be part of a larger content management industry shift, one that could be as important as the move from on-prem to the cloud that Box helped lead 15 years ago.<\/p>\n
Putting content to work<\/h2>\n
Levie is genuinely exuberant about the possibilities the Crooze technology can bring to the platform. \u201cThis is a very big deal. The way to think about it is that for the first time ever within Box, you\u2019re going to be able to build no-code applications that let you render your content for any business process that you want,\u201d Levie told TechCrunch. In other words, users can build custom applications that mirror business processes and make the content much more useful.<\/p>\n
He recognizes that the folder structure can only get you so far, especially when dealing with large amounts of unstructured content like contracts, for example. It becomes unwieldy pretty quickly to try and find a contract, nevermind more-detailed pieces of the contract, when rifling through virtual folders.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut with a no-code application development environment, you can build an actual dashboard that displays all of your contracts, all the data in those contracts and helps you automate the workflows around those contracts,\u201d he said. That could involve editing, approvals, electronic signatures and so forth.<\/p>\n
Generative AI plays a role here, too, letting users query the content in the folders to understand it better or locate specific pieces in a way that traditional enterprise search hasn\u2019t been able to do. Summarization capabilities give users the gist of a large cache of content without having to read every line. In terms of workflow, generative AI\u2019s coding capabilities can help build custom workflows based on particular requirements automatically.<\/p>\n
It feels like Box is entering a new phase, says William Blair analyst Jason Ader, who watches Box. \u201cNow I think we\u2019re seeing Box 3.0, where it is moving into this AI and workflow realm and really going at the heart of a lot of those vertical industry workflows. These are tied to contracts and digital assets in obviously document-heavy types of industries where frankly AI has a massive role to play because it can automate a lot of that work,\u201d Ader said.<\/p>\n
Indeed, the way customers view content is changing. They don\u2019t just want to manage it anymore, they want to put it to work in much the same way that data platforms like Snowflake and Databricks have moved beyond pure data management to building applications on top of it. Just having content sitting in storage repositories isn\u2019t enough anymore, and AI is driving the push to automate workflows and produce practical business productivity outcomes.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the end of the day, enterprises want to leverage that content \u2014 not just store it \u2014 to drive automation and improve business outcomes,\u201d said Alan Pelz-Sharpe, founder and principal analyst at Deep Analysis. \u201cAnd hence acquisitions like Crooze provide ever simpler tools to develop those outcomes. Crooze is probably the most significant acquisition Box has made to date.\u201d<\/p>\n
Content management industry evolution<\/h2>\n
Box is hardly alone in this push, but as generative AI advances the ability to generate content and query the content store, we are starting to see content management and knowledge management (business memory) merging together. What\u2019s more, the ability to generate code could allow companies to create custom workflows on the fly based on the requirements and types of content.<\/p>\n
Cheryl McKinnon, a Forrester analyst who has been covering content for management for two decades, says she sees the content management industry as whole moving in the same direction as Box, and she believes it is a natural progression. \u201cI see this is just moving up the maturity curve, and this shift towards workflow and AI is absolutely where the market has been moving,\u201d McKinnon said. \u201cThis is kind of a turning point where now it\u2019s not just about storing files and folders, but can we put that stuff to work? Can we think about content, not just from the storage point of view, but across the context of a whole business activity?\u201d<\/p>\n
This is a big moment for the whole industry, says Pelz-Sharpe. \u201cThe ECM sector as a whole (which includes Box) now has the biggest window of opportunity they have had in 20 years, opened for them by the interest and embrace of organizations large and small to leverage AI,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He thinks that ECM firms in particular are in a good position to take advantage of AI because they are already ensuring that unstructured data is accurate, relevant, secure and timely. That\u2019s an important piece that AI models need that is often missing, he said. But the question is: Can Box and these other companies execute and take advantage of this moment?<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s important to note that although this window of opportunity is real, there is no guarantee ECM firms will pivot to embrace it,\u201d Pelz-Sharpe said. \u201cFirms like Salesforce, for example, are wising up to the importance of managing unstructured data, as is Oracle [and other industry giants].\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere Box and its ilk currently have an advantage, is that they have dedicated platforms to do this work, and equally importantly, deep skill sets and experience to bring to the table.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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