Ilog has launched version 6.0 of its JRules business rules management (BRM) system and said the new suite can enhance communication between business and IT managers and help IT systems to adapt more quickly to support changing business processes.

Christophe Borde, senior product manager at Ilog, said JRules 6 features three integrated modules, which can help managers to develop more effective business policies; improve control of changes to applications to support modified business rules; and make it easier for development teams to change IT systems.

A RuleCare module provides business managers with "out-of-the-box" tools and wizards for modeling, testing and deploying business policy changes, said Borde. "The business user can change a rule or process and test its success before notifying the IT administrator that there needs to be a change to the application [that supports the changed business process]."

A new FullCircle BRM system then manages rule-lifecycles and "synchronises" any rule changes with the IT departments' application development lifecycles. Meanwhile, the new RuleTech module is designed to increase the pace of application development by supporting integrated development environments (IDEs) backed by the open source Eclipse Foundation.

Borde said the new modules will enhance communication between business managers and the IT department. "Traditionally the problem with business rules is that the business sees them as a process issue, while the IT department sees them as a technical issue," he said. "BRM systems help handle this duality and provide communication lines between the two sides of the business."