Oracle Quarterly Release Analysis

Oracle Quarterly Release Analysis

Our team of experts has reviewed Oracle’s quarterly release notes to curate the new features that have the greatest potential to benefit your organization. Use the arrows to expand the sections and view our analysis.

Common Technology/UI

HCM Data Loader

Business Objects Enhancements

What it Does: Extends data loading capabilities with a new business object for Payroll Localization in the United States.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The Tax Withholding object provides individual components for Federal, state, and local tax.

Approvals and Notifications

Approvals Work Area with Enhanced User Interface and Adaptive Search

What it Does: Instead of using the Worklist: Approvals and Notifications work area, users can use the Approvals work area. The Approvals work area provides an enhanced user interface and an adaptive search functionality. Tasks can be filtered by approval type, task type, sender, or can be searched by keyword.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The Approvals work area is designed and built with performance as a priority. The user experience is improved for both desktop and tablet or mobile users, making it easy to act quickly on approval tasks and notifications.

Extensibility

Updated Oracle Visual Builder Studio

What it Does: Key Benefits Include:

    • Improvements for Edit Page in Visual Builder Studio workflow
    • Support to customize constants or components displayed in Page Designer Properties
    • Business Rule enhancements
    • JavaScript action chain enhancements

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The new Visual Builder Studio functionality provides users with a platform to extend their Fusion Applications extensively.

Application Security

Secure Elements Through HCM Data Roles

What it Does: Define an element security profile on the Data Role and Security Profiles page to restrict access to specific elements through the assigned data (or abstract) role. Users can enter, view, and edit only earnings and deductions that are meant for their respective usage.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Restricts access to elements based on organizational business needs.

CPQ

Pricing​

Block Pricing​​​

What it Does: Allows pricing by blocks of units rather than per unit. Block Pricing applies different unit price values to different items of a single transaction line. The total price or discount of the transaction line is based on aggregating the pricing brackets for all units of the item for that transaction line.​​

(For example, a customer may want to price software in blocks of hundreds or thousands and charge a price for the entire block rather than per each user.)​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Block pricing provides more flexibility, encourages larger purchases, and simplifies fulfillment, rating, and invoicing processes.​​

Enhanced Subscription Price Authoring for Service Durations​​

What it Does: Pricing administrators can define different pricing for the same service product based on the duration for which the customer is committing.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Allows sales users to incentivize customers to commit to longer contract / service durations to reduce churn and the need to resell the service sooner at renewal time.​​

Integration

Microsoft Dynamics 365: CPQ Integration Center​​

What it Does: A new Microsoft Dynamics 365 CRM integration type is added to the Oracle CPQ Integration Center. This feature streamlines the set up and management of the connection(s) between Oracle CPQ and Microsoft Dynamics.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This new interface allows administrators to directly configure the details of the Dynamics environment without the assistance of customer support.​

Coverage Product Support for Oracle Order Management in Integrations​

What it Does: A new Add Covered Product button is available on the Line-Item Grid for coverage products. Sales users can search by Current Quote or Order Number to add a new coverage product.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Enhances ability to sell relevant service products that cover customer-owned assets.​

Financials

Expenses

Audit Evaluation of Resubmitted Expense Reports for Potential Duplicates

What it Does: Allows users to evaluate resubmitted expense reports using audit rules to identify potential duplicates.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This helps auditors identify potential duplicate expenses added to the resubmitted expense report.

Payables

Performance Improvements to the Payables Holds Infotile

What it Does: Users receive invoice hold information more quickly with performance improvements to the Holds infotile in the Invoice landing page. Users can configure the Holds infotile to show the count of invoices on hold for over 7 days (default view), 15 days, 30 days, or all days.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Reduces the time to identify and resolve holds on your supplier invoices, which ultimately allows timely payment and reduces the risk of unnecessary disputes.

Assets

Segregation of Asset Transaction Entry and Transaction Posting Duties Using Spreadsheets

What it Does: Segregate the duties for users who enter and prepare asset transactions and users who review and post the transactions using spreadsheets.

This helps enforce the internal control requirement that users who review and post asset transactions are different from those who create the transactions.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Allows for better internal control and makes sure the transactions are verified before posting, helping to reduce manual errors.

When you segregate duties, two unique users with a custom job role assigned to each user are required for each transaction.

Total Cost Display for Parent Asset Addition Lines in Assets

What it Does: View the total cost of the parent and its merged child addition lines in the Assets Landing page, Lines Selected for Merge dialog box, and Prepare Source Lines page.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The display of the merged cost of the parent and child source lines in the Prepare Source Lines page, Assets landing page, and Lines Selected for Merge dialog box helps users view at a glance the cost at which the asset will be capitalized when it’s added.

HCM

Global Human Resources

Prepare for Discontinuation of Support for Share Personal Info in Update 24B

What it Does: Access to Share Personal Info will be removed and no longer available in the 24B update.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Since Share Personal Info is sometimes used for employment verification, users should evaluate their employment verification business process and implement an alternative process.

By eliminating the Share Personal Info task, external access to employee information will be reduced.

Checklists and Onboarding to be Replaced with Journeys in Update 24D

What it Does: The Onboarding and Checklists Tasks apps will no longer be available for use in the 24D update.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: As a result of onboarding and checklists being replaced with Journeys, support for Responsive Checklist Tasks, Onboarding, and Allocated Checklist pages will be removed.

To prepare for this update, start using Redwood Journeys to manage all journey categories, whether predefined or user-defined.

Payroll Step in Redwood Employment Update Processes

What it Does: Users can now update payroll information in the newly added Payroll details step in the following Redwood employment update processes:

    • Add Assignment
    • Change Assignment
    • Promote
    • Promote and Change Position
    • Transfer

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This feature gives line managers and HR specialists the ability to update payroll information when updating a worker’s employment info and streamline the update process.

Benefits

Enable Redwood Experience for Self-Service Benefits: Self-Report a Life Event Page

What it Does: The Benefits Service Center Benefits Billing page was recreated in the Redwood Toolset to improve the user experience by providing the same consistent functionality across Redwood pages.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: While the functionality of the page remains the same, the feature allows users to experience Redwood’s high-fidelity interactions.

Compensation

Enable Redwood Experience for Administering and Viewing Compensation

What it Does: For a simplified and cohesive user experience throughout the application, users can use the Redwood toolkit to:

    • Administer Compensation
    • View Compensation History/information
    • Change Salary
    • Maintain Attachments

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Functionality of the page remains the same. The Redwood tool kit will create an easier user experience for everyday compensation tasks.

Time and Labor

Timecard Approval Enhancement to Notifications

What it Does: Adds additional information (10 more attributes) to timecard approval notifications for end users.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Timecard approval notification now displays more information to help approvers see all relevant information at a glance.  There will be less time digging for information as it will be readily available on the approval task itself.

Employee Calendar Enhancements

What it Does: Enhances the employee calendar to allow them to more easily track and visualize their absences and pending absences.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The employee calendar now allows for employees to easily see partial, all-day, multiday, and maternity absences on the calendar.  Employees can also track pending absence approvals and better view assigned shifts/work patterns.

Approvals Work Area with Enhanced UI and Adaptive Search

What it Does: Adds new work area for approvals.​​​​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Allows for approvers to filter and utilize adaptive search to more quickly view and taken action on approval tasks assigned to them.​​​

Absence Management

Calculate and Post Accruals at Start of Repeating Period

What it Does: Includes new option for the timing of when accruals are calculated and posted.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Previously, accruals were always posted at the end of the repeating period.  Now organizations can choose to post accruals at the beginning of each period.​

Enhanced Message for Absence on a Scheduled Non-Worker Day

What it Does: Adds better error message for admins when entering absences for employees that have had schedule changes with future-dated absences.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Allows for administrators to more easily and quickly identify future-dated absences that may now be scheduled on a non-working day for an employee after their schedule has changed.​​​​

Assignment Number Displayed with Business Title During Absence Transactions

What it Does: Adds assignment number to business title when adding absences.​​​​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: For employees that have the same business title on multiple assignments, they can now easily identify the correct assignment.​​​

Global Payroll​

Secure Elements Through HCM Data Roles​

What it Does: Allows users to secure and limit access to elements using the HCM Data Roles and the new Element Security Profiles task flow.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Using Security Profile, users can limit the access of elements at Manage element entries, HSDL – Element Entry, Manage Elements and Quick Pay.​

Tax Overrides for a Legislative Data Group​​​​​​​

What it Does: Allows users the ability to override the calculation values defined for the user’s legislation at the Legislative Data Group (LDG) level.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The LDG overrides entered on the Value Definition page are now only active between the start and end dates that the user specifies. When the override expires, the calculation values defined for the user’s legislation will again be used for payroll calculation purposes.​​​​

Support for Updating Absence Entered on Time Card​​​​​​

What it Does: Load only the updated absence entitlement information into the Payroll application, when users update an absence entitlement record that’s entered on a time card using Oracle Time and Labor.​​​​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This enhancement reduces the number of absence and element entries created when an absence is updated. As a result, it also reduces the volume and complexity of retro pay processing for absence changes.​​​

Redwood Experience for:

  • Personal Payment Methods For Self-Service Users
  • Balance By Date
  • ​Run Results

What it Does: These pages or flows have been recreated in the Redwood tool set Visual Builder Studio (VB Studio) to improve the user experience.​​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps:

    • Balance By Date – The Balance by Date page displays balances for an effective date.
    • Run Results – With this new page users can quickly view and manage calculated run results from Payroll and QuickPay processes.​​

Payroll Costing Integration with Labor Distribution​​​​​

What it Does: Users can now distribute payroll cost results to Project Financial Management using labor schedules defined for the employee.​​​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: With the Import Payroll Costs process, you can now transfer payroll costs directly to Project Financial Management.  Distribution status of the payroll costs are available to view using the Process Result Summary and Person Result pages.​​

Recruiting

Explore Jobs Using Oracle Maps​​​​

What it Does: Oracle Maps (announced in Update 23D), replaces Google Maps and Bing Maps for everyone with quicker loading capabilities. In addition, when users click a pin icon for a location to see the jobs, location names are now listed once, followed by a list of job titles which improves the look and feel of the page.​​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Replaces Google Maps and Bing Maps saving organizations on third party costs and integrations.​​​

Candidate Experience Generative AI – Job Fit​​​​

What it Does: The feature uses Generative Adaptive Intelligence (AI) to compare information from a candidate’s profile or uploaded resume with the job information on the job details page. A candidate’s suitability for a job is rated using a 0-5 scaled for skills, job history, education, and other data match the skills, requirements, and job information from the job details page. This element provides a summary of why they received the displayed scores.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This feature increases the quality of job posting as candidates receive immediate information on how well their skills, experience, education, and domain of expertise match the job requirements.​​​

Learning

Export to Microsoft Excel from Redwood Administration Pages​​​

What it Does: Users can now export data in all visible and hidden columns that match the filter criteria on these pages to Microsoft Excel.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This enhancement lets admin users export learning data out of the application.​​

Performance Management​

AI Assistance for Manager Evaluations in Performance Documents​​​

What it Does: Managers can use Artificial Intelligence (AI) assistance to quickly generate overall summary comments for an employee based on participant feedback, anytime feedback, or your own comments. Managers can also use AI assistance to generate tips on how to develop a competency and can then edit the generated content.​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This new feature makes it easy for managers to suggest competency-related improvements or summarize overall comments in an employee’s performance document.​​

Redwood – Introducing Goals Center​​​​​

What it Does: Managers can view and manage both performance and development goals of their team members using the Team Goal Center.​​

Performance Goals Tab​​

    • View these statistics for a goal plan:
        • Number of performance goals that are in various statuses​
        • Number of goals that are aligned​
        • Number of goal plans that are pending approval
    • Identify the number of goals each team member has completed in a goal plan
    • Sort the team members listed by their last name, the last update date of their goals, or the total number of goals assigned to them​
    • Identify team members whose performance goal plans are pending approval​
    • View goals each team member has in a goal plan within the selected review period​
    • Assign performance goals​

Development Goals Tab​​

    • Get information about the number of development goals that are in various statuses​
    • Identify team members whose development plans are pending approval​
    • Assign development goals​

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: Easily manage Performance and Developmental Goals of your team members on one page to enhance their performance and development.​​

Manufacturing & Supply Chain

Procurement Checklists

Create Compliance Checklists for Purchasing Documents

What it Does:Allows the buyers to create compliance checklists to collect and track the completion of compliance documentation required for audit purposes. Buyers can reference compliance checklists on purchasing documents and their associated change orders.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The compliance checklists help facilitate and streamline the collection of required documentation to ensure compliance with procurement rules and regulations. Incorporating checklists in your procurement process by linking them to purchasing transactions reduces business risk while improving audit controls.

Purchasing

Release Planned Buy Orders for Execution with Status as ‘Firm’

What it Does: For planned buy orders, when the supplier creates a date and quantity that’s agreeable to both parties, it allows the user to set the status to firm to indicate that this order shouldn’t be rescheduled.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: It helps release the planned order for execution to Oracle Fusion Cloud Procurement, and this firm status is carried over to the purchase requisition and then onto the resulting purchase order. Users now have a closed loop process so that in subsequent planning cycles the purchase order isn’t eligible for rescheduling.

Sourcing

Reopen Award Decision After Negotiation is Completed

What it Does: With this feature, Category Managers can now reopen an awarded and completed solicitation and change the award decision to pick another supplier even after purchasing documents are created.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This feature helps category managers with the flexibility to manage real-world business challenges.

Procurement Contracts

Sign Contracts with Adobe Acrobat Sign

What it Does: It allows businesses to use Adobe Acrobat to manage the electronic signature process for contract documents created in Enterprise Contracts.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This feature helps contract administrators to prepare the signature process and communicate to the parties using Adobe Acrobat Sign. Contract Admins can also track the electronic signature process and makes the consequent contract status updates.

Manufacturing

Extend Automated Work Execution by Sending Program Parameters and Supporting Automatic Quality Inspection and Disposition

What it Does: With this update end users can extend their current automated work execution with robotic integration to send program parameters and inspection characteristics in addition to the program file information to an automation equipment resource. This will automatically perform completion and rejection transactions based on inspection results received from automation equipment.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This features helps users generate an equipment parameters file template to associate to work definition operation resource defined as automation equipment. Users can Save and upload the .csv file to complete association to the work definition operation resource. Perform automatic quality inspection and disposition through the integration with Oracle Quality Management, based on the sensor data received from automation equipment.

Projects & Portfolio Management

Cost Management and Control

Budgetary Control for Project-Specific Procurement to an Inventory or Work Order Destination

What it Does: Check for funds availability, reserve funds against control budgets, and account for encumbrances, if applicable, when procuring material to an inventory destination for sponsored or non-sponsored projects.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: This capability is also available when procuring material directly to a work order destination from a project-specific manufacturing or maintenance work order.

Billing and Revenue Management

Manage Contract Validations

What it Does: When users submit a contract for approval, the validation process presents any errors and warnings that are found on the contract.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: It can be configured for contract validation rules of the “Warning” type and users can enable or disable them as needed.

Planning Scheduling and Forecasting

Additional Search Attributes for My Projects

What it Does: Allows users to view additional search attributes in the My Projects page, such as customer, organization, classification category, and classification code.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: The My Projects page for the project manager is enhanced with the following capabilities that have been added as search attributes:

    • Organization
    • Customer
    • Class Category
    • Class Code

Resource Management

Mandatory Qualifications for Assigning Resources to Projects

What it Does: Project managers can precisely communicate the most important qualifications required for a role on their project.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​Why it Helps: When searching for qualified resources, the results automatically exclude resources who lack mandatory qualifications.