Software AG Pays $26M for Mainframe UI Tools
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The sale marks Jacadaâs move out of the application modernization and middleware software business in order to concentrate on development of call center systems.
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(InfoWorld) - Software AG plans to unveil details of Version 7.1 of the webMethods business process management suite on Wednesday, along with a new enterprise service bus (ESB) and a supply chain performance optimization tool. WhenÂ Software AG bought webMethodsÂ on June 1, it set ambitious targets forÂ integration of the two companies' product lines. This is the first update to the webMethods BPM suite since the merger: Version 7.0 was launched late in 2006. "They are making quite good progress, considering there's a lot to integrate," said Jason Bloomberg, a managing partner of IT analyst firm ZapThink. Among the BPM features that Software AG plans to unveil are simulation tools for testing the performance of new business processes, preconfigured performance indicators for management methodologies such as Six Sigma, and business calendar integration tools. Those allow the automatic offloading of certain tasks into workflow scheduling systems such as Lotus Notes or Exchange when human intervention is required, said Peter KÃ¼rpick, president and chief product officer of the webMethods product line. WebMethods is also getting its dose of "Web 2.0" technology: a new "tagging" feature will allow users to give the objects involved in business processes recognizable names, rather than those chosen by the program's developers or by systems integrators. "You can have one central instance and different ways of expressing it," KÃ¼rpick said. "This is particularly important when you go into a vertical market," he said, citing health care as an example where software tools borrowed from business might refer to "customers," but users would know them as "patients." Other new software elements include a business activity monitoring tool, Optimize for B2B, designed to give suppliers or customers a view of the supply chain, and the enterprise service bus with support for SOAP 1.2, WS Security, and WS-I. Software AG is already testing webMethods 7.1 with a few customers and will demonstrate it at theÂ Integration World 2007Â conference in Florida in early November. The software will be made generally available by the end of the year, KÃ¼rpick said The company has also been working on its services-oriented architecture (SOA) management and governance tools. It has taken the policy management tools from webMethods' Infravio line and its own CentraSite metadata store, combining them as CentraSite Governance Edition. It will unveil details of that product at the SOA Governance Summit in Copenhagen next month. With its focus on the webMethods BPM suite, Software AG will no longer sell its Crossvision BPM line, actually a rebranded version of Fujitsu's Interstage. Its goal is to help customers migrate to webMethods over the course of several years, during which it will continue to support the discontinued product. However, "customers are not yet lining up for migration," KÃ¼rpick said. This is one area where there's no rush, though, said ZapThink's Bloomberg: the majority of Crossvision BPM customers also use Software AG's Natural programming language and Adabas database, and they have no reason to leave the company.
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Software company releases an update to its Java development tool, NXJ.
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Microsoft Corp has signed a new 500m pound ($920m) contract to supply a desktop operating system and software to the UK&#39;s National Health Service, including provisions to develop a tailored interface for clinical systems.
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The software giant is expected to formally donated the developer tools to the Accessibility Interoperability Alliance, an engineering working group.
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A software tools maker is staking its future on helping developers prepare for streamlined coding for Web services (define) as well as Avalon, the graphics display component in the works for Longhorn, Microsoft&#39;s next version of Windows.
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TechWeb - SAP AG unveils a search application capable of delivering results pulled from across corporate business systems to either a browser-based or desktop user interface.
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The software maker expands its Visual Studio line of developer tools.
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Open-source software maker releases big update to Java-based application server program.
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(InfoWorld) - European car manufacturing giant PSA Peugeot CitroÃ«n has agreed to one of the Continent's largest-ever deployments of open-source Linux software on desktop computers. As part of a multiyear contract with Novell, the French company will install Suse Linux Enterprise Desktop on up to 20,000 computers in addition to 2,500 servers, the U.S. software vendor said Tuesday. The announcement comes on the same day thatÂ Microsoft's new Vista operating system and Office 2007 software suite become commercially available for consumers. Charles King, principle analyst with Pund-IT, a technology research firm, referred to the size of the Novell contract with Peugeot CitroÃ«n as "significant" and the timing of the announcement as "very interesting." "The migration to Vista will require a significant hardware upgrade," King said. "The costs associated with this upgrade will open the door for companies to consider alternatives." Officials from Peugeot CitroÃ«n were unavailable for comment, but Novell said in a statement, quoting an IT representative from the French company, that support for Suse Linux Enterprise Desktop and the user-friendly design of the software were key factors in the selection process. The opportunity to lower IT costs through open-source software almost certainly had to be another factor, King said. Novell provided no financial details of the contract. With Vista and Office being powerful IT tools, King believes that many companies will start asking themselves what sort of functionality their employees need on their desktop computers and, equally important, what they are willing to pay for this functionality. With Vista and Office 2007, King warned, some companies could be purchasing way more functionality then they need. "Let me put it this way: Do you need a Ferrari to go to the neighborhood shopping store when a mini-van will do?" he said.
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InfoWorld - Software AG on Thursday plans to announce its Active Governance Framework (AGF), which features a policy editor for SOA.
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Software giant says the final version will be available next year.
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Thermo Electron Corp., the biggest maker of analytical instruments for medical labs, has bought laboratory software maker InnaPhase Corp. for about $65 million. InnaPhase, of Philadelphia, has about 100 employees and expects revenue of $26 million this year, Waltham-based Thermo Electron said. Thermo had about 10,800 employees and $2.1 billion in sales in 2003. It sold an optics unit to ...
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(InfoWorld) - Software AG will adopt the webMethods name for its Crossvision range of SOA (services oriented architecture) products, executives said Friday, outlining how they will integrate staff and products following the company'sÂ acquisition of webMethods. To eliminate one of the few overlaps in their product lines, Software AG will adopt webMethods' BPM (business process management) offering, and stop selling Fujitsu's Interstage BPM software, which it has distributed since December 2004. However, Software AG will support its existing Interstage customers for at least five years, said Peter KÃ¼rpick, board member responsible for research and development. Another area of overlap is in SOA management and governance, where KÃ¼rpick expects to see Software AG's CentraSite SOA registry and repository combined with webMethods' recently acquired Infravio SOA governance tools by the end of the year. "We are strong in managing metadata, and they are strong in governance policies, rules and regulations," he said. The combined product will likely retain the CentraSite name, he said. All other areas of the companies' product lines are complementary, and there will be no need for customers to migrate, KÃ¼rpick said. KÃ¼rpick will lead the integration of the companies' product development teams, where he expects managers from both companies will take senior roles. It won't be like a classic merger where "you own the body but the head and legs are gone," he said. He sees little need for layoffs as the product development teams are combined: "We already have an R&D force that is 50 percent low-cost, mostly in India, some in Bulgaria, so we already have a good cost structure," he said. Although there may be little scope for payroll savings, CEO Karl-Heinz Streibich expects earnings to improve this year as the two sales forces -- which will remain separate at least through the end of 2007 -- exploit opportunities to cross-sell the two product ranges. The combined entity's revenue will grow organically by 10 percent over the next 12 to 15 months, he said.
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Computer Associates introduces usage-based pricing model for mainframe software.
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(InfoWorld) - IBM Rational on Thursday is announcing plans to provide technical support for the Eclipse open source tools platform, thus giving customers a single point of contact for both open source and IBM's commercial technologies for software development. IBM will also unveil plans for upcoming tools geared to the new Eclipse 3.2 platform, and it is rolling out online developer resources for Eclipse users. IBM is making the announcements at the EclipseWorld conference in Cambridge, Mass. Through its IBM Rational Elite Support for Eclipse program, IBM will for the first time provide support for raw Eclipse tooling, said Scott Hebner, vice president of marketing and strategy at IBM Rational. Tools also will be provided. IBM previously supported IBM Rational products that are based on Eclipse but not for Eclipse tools themselves. Users will be assisted with issues such as solving defects and getting questions answered. IBM Rational, rather than the IBM Global Services group will provide support. "This is an opportunity for the IT managers and development managers to provide a unified support structure," Hebner said. Eclipse users not working with IBM Rational products also can sign up for the Eclipse support. IBM officials noted users are doing mission-critical work and want more accountability for support rather than just relying on the community at large. "They're happy with the level of tooling [from Eclipse]. They're not happy with building [solutions] alone," said Gary Cernosek, offerings manager for analysis, design and construction at IBM Rational. Eclipse 3.2 features Java 5 support, refactoring and a preview of support for the Windows Vista OS. Version 3.2 debuted in July. IBM also will support some Eclipse projects, such as the Web Tools Platform, Test and Performance Tools Platform, and the Eclipse Modeling Framework. With its support effort, IBM is addressing the downside that enterprises face when opting to develop with free, open source tools. according to analyst Bola Rotibi, of Ovum. "The problem many customers have or many enterprises have is not so much from that point of view [of using open source tools], it's when things go wrong," Rotibi said. "IBM is basically saying, well, OK, we understand this issue and [you need] a unified support approach or a unified support framework," Rotibi said. The support program costs $400 per developer for a one-year subscription for unlimited calling. Support will be available in the fourth quarter of this year. IBM at the show also is announcing a preregistration effort for participating in beta programs for three upcoming products based on Eclipse 3.2. These products are Lotus Designer 6, which is a rapid application development tool to build components to run WebSphere Portal 6.0; IBM Rational Software Architect Release 7, for UML (Unified Modeling Language) modeling, and IBM Rational Functional Tester 7, for automated testing. Tools improve the ability to visually construct services for SOA. Enhanced support for geographically distributed development also is a highlight. Rational Software Architect also features modeling for code reconciliation and Functional Tester can be used to test services, business processes and SAP applications. IBM's new tools ship by the end of the year. New resources on IBM's developerWorks site are in the Eclipse and Rational skill zones. These resources help developers build skills in Eclipse 3.2 and include a course on building "cheat sheets" Eclipse 3.2, for performing complex Eclipse tasks. Education, tutorials and resources are featured for Eclipse 3.2.
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All funded up with somewhere to go In an apparent response to our story yesterday, Azul Systems today announced the completion of a $40m funding round. The Java server appliance start-up stressed that "top tier" investors participated in the funding, including Accel Partners, Austin Ventures, ComVentures, Credit Suisse, JVax Investment Group, Meritech Capital Partners, Redpoint Ventures and Worldview Technology Partners. "All existing investors in the company participated in the financing."â¦