LITIGATION DOCUMENT MANAGEMENT LINKING UNSTRUCTURED DOCUMENTS WITH BUSINESS OBJECTS

1 . A computer implemented method, comprising:

determining that an unstructured document is associated with a business objected stored at an enterprise resource planning system;

storing link information identifying the business object in connection with the unstructured document in a content management system;

identifying a litigation matter;

executing an electronic discovery process across a plurality of object types for the identified litigation matter to identify relevant objects using a rules repository, the electronic discovery process being operable to automatically discover relationships among a plurality of the relevant objects;

detecting that the unstructured document is a relevant object; and

based on the link information stored in connection with the unstructured document, determining that the business object is also a relevant object.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the unstructured document comprises an attachment to an email message.

3 . The method of claim 2 , further comprising:

placing a legal hold on at least a first of the relevant objects; and

visualizing information for at least a portion of the relevant objects.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the link information includes at least one of: (i) an object identifier, (ii) an object type identifier, and/or (iii) an origin system identifier.

5 . The method of claim 3 , wherein information associated with at least a portion of the relevant objects is stored in a lookup table.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the stored information comprises information for parent objects and the lookup table stores data defining relationships between the relevant objects and parent objects.

7 . The method of claim 5 , wherein an application programming interface (API) enables access to the lookup table by one or more remote applications.

8 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the litigation matter identified through a user interface is associated with a case type and a unique identifier.

9 . The method of claim 8 , wherein the electronic discovery process using rules associated with the case type from the rules repository.

10 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the object types comprise at least a subset of business object, archive data, document, e-mail, and source code.

11 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the visualized information is presented through an interface and filtered based on a personalization rule.

12 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the visualized information comprises a tree view of at least one of the relationships.

13 . The method of claim 3 , wherein software comprises an electronic discovery framework communicably coupled with the rules repository, a legal hold framework communicably coupled with the lookup table, and a front-end for visualizing the information.

14 . The method of claim 13 , wherein the electronic discovery framework includes an archive module, a source code module, a business object module, and an e-mail module.

15 . The method of claim 14 , wherein each framework is associated with a plurality of application programming interfaces (APIs) exposed for use by a plurality of applications.

16 . A computer-readable medium storing program code executable by a computer to:

determine that an unstructured document is associated with a business objected stored at an enterprise resource planning system;

store link information identifying the business object in connection with the unstructured document in a content management system;

identify a litigation matter;

execute an electronic discovery process across a plurality of object types for the identified litigation matter to identify relevant objects using a rules repository, the electronic discovery process being operable to automatically discover relationships among a plurality of the relevant objects;

detect that the unstructured document is a relevant object; and

based on the link information stored in connection with the unstructured document, determine that the business object is also a relevant object.

17 . The medium of claim 16 , wherein the unstructured document comprises an attachment to an email message and execution of the instructions further cause the processor to:

place a legal hold on at least a first of the relevant objects; and

visualize information for at least a portion of the relevant objects.

18 . The medium of claim 17 , wherein the link information includes at least one of: (i) an object identifier, (ii) an object type identifier, and/or (iii) an origin system identifier.

19 . A system, comprising:

an enterprise resource planning system storing business objects;

a content management system storing unstructured documents; and

and attachment service to:

determine that an unstructured document is associated with a business objected stored at an enterprise resource planning system, and

store link information identifying the business object in connection with the unstructured document in a content management system.

20 . The system of claim 19 , further comprising:

a search component to receive a search element associated with a litigation matter, identify a first unstructured document based on the search element, and identify a first business object based on the first unstructured document and associated information generated by the attachment service.

21 . The system of claim 20 , further comprising:

a visualization service to provide search results associated with the litigation matter to a user