Appian Corporation is a company that develops and sells Business Process Management

Business process management

Business process management is a holistic management approach focused on aligning all aspects of an organization with the wants and needs of clients. It promotes business effectiveness and efficiency while striving for innovation, flexibility, and integration with technology. BPM attempts to...

 software for companies including those in the government, financial services, insurance, healthcare, energy, manufacturing, and retail industries. The firm's headquarters is in the Washington, DC metro area.

In an April 2010 report from industry analyst firm Gartner, Appian was named one of the six fastest-growing vendors in the world-wide Application Infrastructure and Middleware Software market.

The company's first major success was building Army Knowledge Online

Army Knowledge Online

Army Knowledge Online provides web-based enterprise information services to Army, joint, and DoD customers. Enterprise services are provided to these customers on both classified and unclassified networks, and include portal, e-mail, directory, discovery, and single sign-on functionality...

 (AKO), the corporate intranet service for the United States Army

United States Army

The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

. AKO has been called "the world's largest intranet." The site supports more than 2.2 million Army, joint and DoD users and allows access to more than 1,100 applications.