Despite efforts to sell its own application server software, Sun
Microsystems has agreed to ship an evaluation copy of BEA's
WebLogic Server with the Solaris 9 operating system.
Sun will include a six-month trial copy of WebLogic Server 7.0 with
the next update to the Sun Solaris 9 operating system, which is set
to arrive next month. BEA's product will sit alongside the free Sun
ONE (Open Net Environment) Application Server 7 Platform Edition
and a similar evaluation copy of the higher-end Sun ONE Application
Server 7 Standard Edition, said Graham Lovell, director of Solaris
marketing at Sun.
Analysts said Sun is making a concession to include BEA's product
alongside its own to satisfy customer demand and help boost sales
of its own server hardware.
"Sun recognised what its real business interests are," said John
Rymer, a vice-president of research at Giga Information Group.
"There have been certain software partners that have helped them
drive a lot of sales - Oracle is one and BEA is the other."
BEA's application server has sold well on Sun's servers, creating a
profitable relationship for both companies. The union took an
unwelcome twist for BEA earlier this year when Sun announced that
it would ship an entry-level version of its competing application
server with Solaris at no charge.
BEA has a large lead over Sun in the application server market, and
Sun hoped to chip away at that lead by bundling its own product
with Solaris.
"There was a rift [with BEA] over Sun's desire to have its own
application server, and I think cooler heads have prevailed," Rymer
said. "This gives customers a chance to test the product and decide
whether it's useful or whether the price is justified."
Mike Gilpin, a research director with Giga, agreed. "A lot of Sun
customers use BEA, and a lot of Sun sales people have found they
can effect a sale more readily when they collaborate in the channel
with BEA," he said. "Sun is interested in doing things that
maximize its business."
Applications servers work as a platform for controlling business
software such as e-commerce applications and for distributing data
to various client devices. While Sun has worked hard to promote its
own Sun ONE Application Server, it has been careful not to exclude
long-time partner BEA from its strategy.
"BEA's application server is a great product," said Sun chairman,
chief executive officer and president Scott McNealy. "If there are
some very high-end enterprise features that you need, it makes
sense. For the bulk of the J2EE environments, the low cost and
integrated nature of the Sun ONE Application Server might make more
sense."
The evaluation copy of the WebLogic Server is for a single
processor and 20 concurrent users, said Gamiel Gran, vice-president
of strategic alliances at BEA.
The deal with Sun is similar to one reached earlier this year
between Hewlett-Packard and BEA. HP includes an evaluation copy of
BEA's application server with systems running the HP-UX operating
system. Gran said BEA is open to the idea of signing up Dell and
IBM to include the software with their servers.
BEA and IBM lead the application server market with roughly equal
share, followed by Oracle, Sun and other smaller vendors, according
to analyst estimates.
Gran said the announcement with Sun should help send a message to
customers that the companies continue to have a strong
relationship. Most of BEA's software runs on Sun Solaris, a flavour
of Unix.
However, Giga's Gilpin did not think the deal would provide a big
advantage for BEA over IBM.
"Certainly, the relationships that BEA establishes with systems
vendors such as Sun or HP are useful in the broader competition
with IBM, but this specific deal probably doesn't make a lot of
difference," he said.
"Where the difference would be made is if it was a full licensed
version of WebLogic available in a bundling deal where the overall
pricing became more attractive. This is more a case of BEA seeding
the channel with evaluation products," Gilpin added