News

Microsoft and Software AG Discuss Babylon Agreement

• By Scott Bekker
• 03/21/2000

Today’s announcement, which spawned from Microsoft’s (www.microsoft.com) headquarters in Redmond, Wash., comes after Software AG (www.softwareag.com) discussed the same agreement at the CeBit trade show in Hannover, Germany in late February.

Microsoft Host Integration Server 2000, currently in beta testing and expected to be released by midyear 2000, enables customers to integrate existing host applications with the Windows platform. The agreement aims to extend Microsoft’s COM Transaction Integrator (COMTI) feature to 3270 I/O-based Customer Information Control System (CICS) applications. The arrangement also includes support for Software AG's Natural applications. Software AG will adapt its existing OS/390-based technology to integrate tightly with COMTI, and will sell the new offering, the Software AG CICS 3270 Adapter for Host Integration Server 2000.

The immediate benefit for Software AG and Microsoft customers is the ability to plug terminal-oriented applications from mainframe platforms into applications running on a Windows 2000-based or Windows NT Server-based operating system. This enables users to combine the benefits of existing mainframe applications with the huge business potential of new technologies.

"For our customers, extending the functional spectrum of our host-integration technology in this way is essential to the long-term protection of existing investments and allows them to leverage the Windows DNA 2000 platform," Tod Nielsen, vice president of marketing for the Developer Group at Microsoft, said in a statement.

The Software AG CICS 3270 Adapter for Host Integration Server 2000 is expected to be broadly available during the third quarter of 2000. – Thomas Sullivan