The biggest heavyweights in the computer industry will be on hand this week at Internet World, weighing in with products and plans that attempt to leverage their technology into winning tickets on the World Wide Web.
Computer Associates (CA), Microsoft, Sun, Oracle and Intel, just to list some of the biggest IT names, will be showing off new technology or offering up their top executives to explain how their product families can be used by companies that want to set up shop to do business online.
On Wednesday CA, joined by development partner Fujitsu, is set to launch the long-awaited Jasmine, which they bill as the first "pure object" database for companies that want to build Internet-based business applications. Jasmine, whose release has been delayed for at least a year, will be incorporated as the underlying database for CA’s flagship Unicenter network-management application next year, according to CA.
On the same day, Microsoft, SAP AG and Commerce One are scheduled to announce strategic partnerships and demonstrate a new Commerce One application. Commerce One was founded by former Sybase CEO Mark Hoffman, and has teamed up with several systems integrators and MCI to help secure a position as a provider of electronic commerce services to Fortune 1000 companies.
In addition to product debuts and announcements of joint ventures, there will also be a lot of talk about how to improve marketing and attract advertising dollars on the Web. Aside from a variety of seminars devoted to the subject, Intel will host its own "executive advertising roundtable," where consumer companies will discuss how to create interactive advertising.
Oracle CEO and Chairman Larry Ellison will be on hand to promote network computers in a Wednesday keynote, and on Thursday, Sun is slated to showcase business applications for NCs. Sun and Oracle also will join efforts to promote Internet-related uses for NCs, when executives from the two companies highlight recent Oracle and Sun developments in the network computing environment and evaluate business issues including total cost of ownership, return on investment, ease of deployment, interoperability and investment preservation.