Oracle is continuously working to improve the features and functionality of its Cloud Apps software. The latest updates (released in early September 2023) offer a range of updates in Billing, Cost, Planning, Resource, Program, and Grant management. This Quarterly Release introduces several new or enhanced features to better support its Oracle Cloud PPM customers. 

In Project Management Common

Service Excellence Continuing Investments 

• Grant Management: Increased Size of Award Reference Value has been extended from 30 to 300 characters.
•  Planning, Scheduling, and Forecasting: Improved Performance of the Update Action for Rescheduling High-Volume Projects has eliminated the page timeout issues related to projects with high-volume tasks. This feature addresses a vital issue customers managing large projects have faced when leveraging Project Execution.  
•  Program Management and Reporting: enhancements seamlessly support switching between program types and default reporting period options. 

Billing and Revenue Management

• Additional Bill and Revenue Plan Analysis Using OTBI (Customer Submitted Idea): Many Bill Plan Attributes and Revenue Plan Attributes are now available to drive improved analysis and decision-making.
•  Attach Documents when Emailing Contract (Customer Submitted Idea): This feature allows for the attachment of additional documents when emailing a contract.
•  Bill Transaction Creation on Billing Event Creation: The 23 C release delivered the ability to generate Bill Transactions on Cost Import under Controlled Availability. The 23D release provides the ability to generate Billing Transactions when creating Billing Events under Controlled Availability. The intent of creating Billing Transactions upon Cost Import and/or Billing Event creation is to allow for the real-time record of WIP Transactions. You must log an SR with Oracle Support to enable this functionality.
•  Configure Contract Approval Notifications: You can now configure Contract Approval notifications to set the content and layout according to specific business needs. You can leverage BI Publisher, RTF Templates, and the BI Data Model to support this feature.
•  Display Approval History from Contract Search (Customer Submitted Idea): The status of Pending Approval now acts as a link to allow users to review the approval status of the Contract. 
•  Improved Manage Project Invoices User Experience for Project Managers (Customer Submitted Idea): Project Managers can now view additional Invoices and Payment statuses for a project contract using the Manage Project Invoices Page. The new page supports the ability to drill down to the Invoice Details page for project contract invoices to view invoice lines and distributions, contract limits, and financial summaries. This new feature allows Project Managers to view invoice status, exceptions, and payment status from a single place to manage their contract billing. 
•  Optional Exclusion of Grouping Attributes from Invoice Line Description (Customer Submitted Idea): Project Application Administrators or Billing Specialists can now exclude invoice line grouping attributes from the Invoice Line Description. 

In Cost Management & Control

• Project Role Capture on Time Cards (Customer Submitted Idea): To further enhance the functionality related to Role Based Billing, Oracle has now added Project Role as an option for OTL Timecard Layouts. This update will allow users to identify the Role they are performing for a specific project charge and ensure proper invoice generation by leveraging Role Based Billing. 

In Planning, Scheduling and Forecasting

• Financial Plan Rate Refresh Excludes Disabled Resources (Customer Submitted Idea): The Refresh Rates action and scheduled process now skip disabled resources on the Resource Breakdown Structure without needing to identify them. Thus eliminating the tedious process of performing a line-by-line Rate Refresh to skip the disabled resources. 
•  Project Organization List of Values Using a REST API: Developers can use this REST API as an input to other APIs when the organization requires it as an input. The API returns all organizations, regardless of Business Unit or Hierarchy, with attributes, including Project Task Owning, Project Expenditure Owning, and Department Classifications.
•  New Public Events for the following: Change Order Status Change, Issue Status Change, Work Plan Baseline Creation, Financial Plan Creation, and Financial Plan Status Changes.

In Resource Management

• Maximize Utilization with Additional Resource Information (Customer Submitted Idea): Resource Managers can now view the Person Type, which indicates if a resource is an Employee or Contingent Worker. This update ensures that Employees are given staffing priority over Contingent Workers to maximize Resource Utilization. 
•  Visual Resource Planning and Scheduling Enhancements: In 23 C, Oracle significantly improved Resource Management through the Interactive Resource Schedule Gantt chart. The improvement in 23D further enhances this functionality by allowing users to make the following changes within the Gantt chart: 1) Edit Assignment Type, Location, Rates, and Comments; 2) Edit or Delete Resource Events; 3) Ability to review Assignment Schedule Date Adjustments.

In Grant Management

• Additional Financial Measures in Manage Awards: This new feature allows for new ITD and PTD Measures for the following items by Currency Type:
  • Project Currency: Funding Amount, Budget Amount, Unbudgeted Amount, Actuals, and Commitments 
  • Ledger Currency: Budget Amount, Actuals, and Commitments 
•  Funding Pattern Data in OTBI: This functionality provides the capability to view and report on Funding Patterns that could be at risk of impacting Project Cost Distribution. Thus, identifying to the user those patterns that need to be updated due to expiring funding to ensure there are no impacts on Project Cost Distribution and Procurement Activities. 

As you can see, a number of improvements are coming to Oracle Cloud PPM with the 23D Quarterly Update, most of which came from customers. What do these updates mean for your project-centric organization? Reach out to your Project Partners consultant today.