ISV Support, Portability Key To Survival Of New Java Enterprise System

Speaking at a panel at the Sun Network show in San Francisco, several Sun solution providers and industry analysts said Sun needs the support of the ISV community to make its Java Enterprise System a success in the marketplace. Sun's Java Enterprise System is a combination of Java-based software pre-integrated and released every quarter for a per-employee yearly subscription.

"They need the good housekeeping seal of approval from [companies like] BMC and Lawson Oracle," said Rob Mock, president and CEO of Brighton, Mich.-based solution provider Dewpoint, who called Sun's current lack of ISV support for its software "a roadblock to the tornado" of possible customer support for the product.

Sun also needs to offer the software suite on other operating systems other than Solaris, the OS on which the initial product is available. While a Linux version is planned for early next year, panel members agreed that Sun must eventually offer the software on Microsoft's Windows OS, as well.

"I think they have to port it to other platforms if they want to be taken seriously as a software company," said Shawn Willett, principal analyst with Sterling, Va.-based analyst firm Current Analysis. "If it just runs on Solaris, I think they open themselves up to [traditional Sun] criticism that they are just trying to sell their hardware [because] the hardware makes most of the revenue anyway."

Dewpoint's Mock agreed. "It will be on Windows before too long," he predicted of the Java Enterprise System.

Panel members also warned that the system, which Sun is offering for a yearly subscription rate of $100 per employee versus the traditional per-CPU pricing for software, is not for every customer.

"The pricing might be prohibitive for certain organizations," said Marc Maselli, president and CEO of Boston-based Back Bay Technologies. "For a retailer with 100,000 employees, it's a tough pill to swallow."

Panel members said the best customers for the software suite are those who average a significant number of Web transactions to serve a large customer base, but have an employee head count substantially lower than the size of that customer base.

Dewpoint's Mock also said an organization with a large indirect field staff, such as a large health system that has multiple affiliated practices, also could be a good fit for Sun's Java Enterprise System.