Microsoft Drives XML Web Services Integration Through .NET Enterprise Servers

ATLANTA, June 18, 2001 — At Tech ·Ed 2001, Microsoft Corp. today took its enterprise strategy to the next level with the release of Microsoft® Mobile Information 2001 Server, the first public demonstration of Content Management Server, and the announcement that the Microsoft SQL Server™
business has now surpassed $1 billion in annual revenue. In addition, in his keynote address, Paul Flessner, senior vice president of the .NET Enterprise Server Division at Microsoft, showed a sold out audience of developers a host of enterprise customer wins highlighting the business value of Microsoft .NET Enterprise Servers and XML Web services deployed today on the .NET platform.

“The single largest challenge facing enterprises today is integration, and as companies increasingly rely on the Internet to facilitate e-business, the integration imperative has become more acute,”
Flessner said.
“Today’s announcements show how Microsoft is driving XML Web services into the core of its Enterprise Server products. Using XML Web services, enterprise developers are able to solve integration problems with ease and deliver flexible solutions that adapt to changing industry dynamics and business opportunities.”

“Simplicity is both the Web services concept’s promise and strength,”
said David Smith, vice president and research director for Gartner Inc.
“Businesses that ignore its potential, or decide to sit out its early stages will find themselves outpaced by rivals that take advantage of Web services to improve their agility and even to transform themselves into new kinds of enterprises.”

During his keynote, Flessner announced several customer wins, clearly highlighting the business value of the .NET Enterprise Servers and XML Web services deployed on the .NET Platform:

  • Dollar Rent-A-Car is reaping technical and business benefit through XML Web services today by leveraging the .NET Enterprise Servers. The company is using XML Web services to facilitate direct programmatic access by an airline partner’s system to the Dollar reservation system, which it projects will generate an incremental $10 million in annual revenue. The Microsoft platform enabled Dollar Rent-A-Car to shorten its development time from eight months to two months and has become a strategic methodology for integration across the company.

  • eSkye Solutions, a service network and technology solutions provider for the global beverage industry, is using XML Web services and the .NET Enterprise Servers as the foundation for a solution connecting the beverage industry supply chain end-to-end. Because of the diverse range of heterogeneous technology employed by its customers, eSkye is relying on XML Web services as its strategic integration architecture to rapidly and cost-effectively its deliver solutions.

  • Verizon Communications has deployed a business-critical solution running on the .NET Enterprise Servers. The solution streamlines and simplifies service ordering, billing and repair processes; it currently supports 7,500 customer service representatives and manages 9 terabytes of data across four regional datacenters, and has helped Verizon save millions of dollars per year compared to the legacy systems it replaced. Verizon plans to further expand this system to additional datacenters in the mid-Atlantic and Northeastern states that the company serves. Later this summer, the company plans to deploy these capabilities online to all Verizon consumer and business customers.

“Verizon is pleased with the global-class capabilities delivered by the Microsoft platform,”
said Fari Ebrahimi, senior vice president for retail markets and national operations at Verizon Communications.
“Verizon has been able to build a strategic platform to enable service excellence in a matter of months instead of years. Furthermore, the Microsoft platform offers headroom for growth and expansion at a fraction of the cost of the previous legacy solution. We are realizing the promise of enterprise agility.”

During his keynote, Flessner also called out the tremendous momentum generated by the 11 products that make up the .NET Enterprise Servers since they were first launched last September, including the following milestones:

  • Microsoft SQL Server. In addition to maintaining its position as the world’s fastest database, SQL Server surpassed $1 billion in revenue during fiscal year 2001, has licensed over 1 million servers, and has for the first time surpassed competitors to achieve the No. 1 database spot on the fastest-growing database platform, the Windows® operating system.

  • Mobile Information 2001 Server. Now available worldwide, Mobile Information 2001 Server extends the reach of enterprise applications, data and intranet content into the realm of the mobile user. Mobile Information 2001 Server provides wireless access to the Outlook® messaging and collaboration client and Exchange information, infrastructure for extending applications built on the .NET Enterprise Servers to mobile devices, and the secure routing and delivery of notifications and alerts to multiple mobile devices.

  • Content Management Server 2001. As a result of the recently closed acquisition of NCompass Labs Inc., Content Management Server 2001will be available by the end of the third quarter of this year. Content Management Server dramatically reduces the time required to build and deploy highly dynamic Internet, intranet and extranet sites that support multilingual content and target content for multiple devices, and offers out-of-the-box integration with Commerce Server 2000.

About Microsoft .NET Enterprise Servers

The Microsoft .NET Enterprise Servers offer a comprehensive range of solutions for building an integrated and flexible business infrastructure. From messaging and collaboration to database management, and from e-commerce to mobile information access, Microsoft .NET Enterprise Servers offer the scalability, reliability and manageability today’s agile businesses need to remain competitive.

About Tech
·
Ed

Tech · Ed, one of Microsoft’s premiere developer training events, which reach over 400,000 people worldwide, provides attendees with access to technical experts, the latest technical information and hands-on labs to learn the skills they need to build state-of-the-art solutions. Special thanks belong to the sponsors of Tech · Ed 2001: BindView Corp., Compaq Computer Corp., Dell Computer Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., IBM Corp., NetIQ Corp. and VERITAS Software Corp.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq
“MSFT”
) is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software — any time, any place and on any device.

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