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Subject: SOA Software Acquires Mainframe Web Services Product from Merrill Lynch


 
SOA Software Acquires Mainframe Web Services Product from Merrill Lynch

Launches the product commercially as Service Oriented Legacy
Architecture


SANTA MONICA, Calif.- December 5, 2005-SOA Software, the leading
provider of comprehensive SOA and Web services management, security and
governance solutions, today announced the acquisition of the X4ML
Mainframe Web services platform from Merrill Lynch.  The purchase of
this patent-pending technology provides SOA Software with a production
proven, unique Mainframe Web services solution that complements SOA
Software's existing products to create a complete SOA Infrastructure
solution addressing B2B, legacy and distributed applications.

Merrill Lynch began designing and building X4ML in 2001 and is currently
running version three of the platform in production, exposing and
consuming more than 600 Web services and processing more than 1.5
million transactions per day.  The team responsible for creating and
managing the platform comprises industry-leading experts in CICS and
z/OS programming, and XML, Web services and distributed technologies.
This team has joined SOA Software to continue the development of its
technology and see its wide adoption in the market through SOA
Software's sales channels.

 "Merrill Lynch is extremely proud of the technology our team created
for Mainframe Web services with the X4ML platform," said Andy Brown,
chief technology architect of Merrill Lynch.  "We are very excited that
SOA Software has chosen to purchase this technology and take it to
market as SOLATM.  As the premier vendor of SOA infrastructure
solutions, SOA Software is uniquely equipped to ensure that this
technology and team achieves the success that it so richly deserves."

SOA Software is launching the product under the product and brand name
of SOLA (Service Oriented Legacy Architecture).  SOLA will be offered as
a standalone product, and as an integrated part of SOA Software's
comprehensive infrastructure solutions. 

"Organizations with strategic mainframe platforms should consider an
integration strategy based on a service-oriented architecture," said
Dale Vecchio, research vice president at Gartner in a recent report.[i]
<outbind://6/#_edn1>  "Interest in exposing current systems as services
and events is showing growth in the marketplace."

"For large organizations, embracing an SOA framework provides a
business-oriented flexibility not possible before. This new capability
adds a great deal of value to SOA Software's holistic approach to SOA
Infrastructure deployments," said William Mougayar, vice president and
service director, Aberdeen Group. The experience acquired from a
demanding environment such as Merrill Lynch is a useful proof-point for
legacy applications enablement into SOAs."

SOA Software's SOLA, solves one of today's most pressing problems -
integrating new distributed applications with legacy mainframe
applications. It provides customers with a fast, easy, reliable and
secure way to expose mainframe applications as Web services, and allows
mainframe applications to consume Web services. SOLA runs as a set of
mainframe applications to capitalize on the reliability and performance
offered by this platform to deliver Web services with minimal overhead
and low, fixed costs.

SOLA enables mainframes to expose and consume Web services. It is a
unique single solution that bridges the gap between databases and
applications on the mainframe and the distributed world, leveraging
decades of investment. SOLA accomplishes this without any additional
hardware, software, middleware, coding or cross-platform skills
training. 

SOLA's toolset reduces application development cost and time to market.
Most importantly, this is a proven product, as it is used successfully
in extensive production roll-out today at Merrill Lynch processing more
than 1.5 million transactions daily. 

SOLA offers unique value to SOA Software's customer for many reasons,
including:

*	An enterprise ready, standards-based, mainframe Web services
platform with performance and scalability proven in production at
Merrill Lynch 
*	Easy to use, fully-integrated, user-centric mainframe Web
services development environment 
*	Cost-effective platform requires no additional hardware or
software for Web services run time

SOLA key features include:

*	Services are published by the service owner (usually the
mainframe programmer) 
*	Standards-based solution, including Web services standards
WS-Security and WS-Policy 
*	Services are automatically documented in a centralized UDDI
repository 
*	Browser-based Development Environment does not require high-end
workstation to create services 
*	Production proven, high performance 
*	No middleware required - services are hosted on the mainframe

CICS is still the backbone of many mainframe systems, linking end-users
to terminals, databases, files and applications, supporting existing
legacy systems that process billions of transactions on a daily basis.
Corporate IT organizations are struggling to satisfy the demands that
businesses place on them.  Challenges include:

*	Delivering return on assets (ROA) through reuse 
*	Keeping the business stable 
*	Lowering operating costs 
*	Responding to rapidly changing market conditions 
*	Modernizing the application portfolio
        
"The acquisition of Merrill Lynch's X4ML platform and team extends our
leadership position in the SOA Infrastructure Market," said Eric Pulier,
chairman and founder of SOA Software.  "Every large enterprise needs SOA
and Web services solutions to reduce the cost and improve the agility of
legacy, B2B and distributed applications.  Only SOA Software offers a
comprehensive integrated suite of products that address all of these
challenges."

Pricing and Availability

SOLA will be available in December 2005, pricing will start at $125,000.


About SOA Software

SOA Software is the leading provider of comprehensive enterprise-class
SOA management, security and governance solutions.  SOA Software's
products include the award-winning Service Manager(tm), Registry(tm),
XML VPN(tm), and SOLA(tm).  Service Manager provides a high-performance,
scalable SOA Management solution. XML VPN makes it easy for companies to
securely publish B2B Web services for its partners to consume.  SOA
Software's UDDIv3 compliant Registry is the first product to integrate
service discovery with policy and performance management. SOLA is the
only production-proven mainframe Web services solution for CICS
programmers. These enterprise-class products combine to create the only
complete SOA Infrastructure solution available today.  SOA Software is a
privately held company backed by leading investors including Redpoint,
Mellon Ventures, Palisades Ventures Fund and Paladin Capital Group. For
more information, please visit http://www.soa.com <http://www.soa.com/>



SOA Software and Service Manager are trademarks of SOA Software, Inc.
All other names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their
respective owners.

________________________________

[i] <outbind://6/#_ednref1>  Gartner Research "Mainframe Integration
Emerges as a Growing Market Opportunity" by Dale Vecchio. October 4,
2005.

http://www.soa.com/index.php/section/company_press_detail/soa_software_a
cquires_mainframe_web_services_product_from_merrill_lynch/

SOLA Launch_FINAL .doc



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