Wakesoft Platform Moves Web Services To IT Mainstream

Wakesoft plans to make its Wakesoft Architecture Platform, Version 4, generally available Monday, said Shirley Foster, CEO of Wakesoft. The product costs $35,000 per CPU, with an additional fee of $4,995 per developer for unlimited training, support and the developer license.

The new product enables solution providers to structure an IT system to implement Web services, providing the services deployment and monitoring capabilities as well as configuration of business logic, Foster said.

"It allows you to structure your system into services that can be extended and built over time and dynamically add new business capabilities," she said.

Wakesoft Architecture Platform is optimized to run with both BEA WebLogic and IBM WebSphere J2EE application servers. It also is tightly integrated with JBoss Group's open-source application server.

Wakesoft's flagship product, Wakesoft Architecture Server, was designed to help J2EE developers build applications faster and more efficiently. Wakesoft Architecture Platform extends that product to enable the gradual buildout of services-oriented systems, Foster said.

Wakesoft is not alone in its move to provide tools for deploying large systems that communicate using Web services. Small ISVs such as The Mind Electric, Systinet and Digital Evolution also are jockeying for position alongside large vendors such as IBM.

In fact, two startups recently dropped out of the market. Mountain View, Calif.-based AltoWeb shut its doors completely several months ago, while Web Putty, San Jose, Calif., failed to get the customers it needed to win additional funding and is mulling its next move, industry analysts said.

Foster said Wakesoft has 14 customers, the majority of which are Fortune 1000 companies, and is building out a channel strategy with key solution providers.

Chris Lininger, senior consultant at Cincinnati-based Cardinal Solutions Group, said implementing Wakesoft's Architecture Server in a current project saved the company two months of work.

Wakesoft also provides a "tremendous amount of flexibility" for developers using its architecture, Lininger said. Rather than locking in a developer to build an application in a specific way, Wakesoft allows solution providers to "customize virtually everything."