IBM Spells Out Web Services Strategy

Officials from IBM Software Group and IBM Global Services, along with IBM software brands Lotus and Tivoli, fleshed out Big Blue's overall approach to Web services, one that focuses on open standards and support of both Java-based Web services and Microsoft's .Net platform. Most of the attention, however, was focused on IBM's middleware brands, specifically the WebSphere platform and application server, as the key to driving growth and adoption of Web services in the enterprise market.

IBM officials say the company will invest $700 million in WebSphere this year, which grew rapidly in 2001 and gained significant market share against BEA's WebLogic application server, which was the market leader last year.

"It's no surprise that 2001 was a difficult year for software, but IBM was a notable exception," says John Swainson, general manager of IBM's application and integration middleware division. "WebSphere probably took the market share lead away from BEA, although that remains to be seen."

WebSphere's portfolio, which includes application server, development tools, and portal software, was flagged as the centerpiece of IBM's Web services strategy and was first made Web services compatible last June. Scott Hebner, director of marketing for IBM software, says the company will continue to use WebSphere to develop and deploy Web services for a variety of standards and technologies. Hebner says the platform is unique because it supports heterogeneous environments and connects to various levels of the customer's infrastructure, such as applications and business processes.

To offer such a high degree of connectivity through WebSphere, IBM has rolled out support of all major technologies and Internet standards, which has been a key selling point for Big Blue's Web services push. IBM has been a major contributor to Java, J2EE and UDDI and offers strong support for XML, SOAP, WSDL--even .Net. While IBM and Microsoft have two distinct and separate Web services strategies and product lines, the technology giants teamed up recently to form the Web Services Interoperability Organization (WS-I), a group focused on developing interoperable standards to connect multiple platforms, applications and programming languages. Accenture, Intel, BEA, Hewlett-Packard and Oracle are also members of WS-I.

"The world is heterogeneous," says Robert Sutor, director of e-business standards strategy at IBM. "If customers buy our software and they can't communicate with Microsoft, BEA and other competitors, we fail."

IBM, however, will be walking a fine line with Microsoft. While Big Blue has attacked such threats as BEA, Sun and Oracle, the company is restrained with Microsoft because it sees opportunity around .Net, Microsoft's proprietary Web services platform. IBM officials say they're concentrating on getting Microsoft to support open standards, and it has worked to a degree. Along with forming WS-I, the two companies worked together on developing SOAP.

But IBM is quick to remind that Microsoft no longer supports Java and is also basing .Net on its proprietary Wintel architecture. So IBM is focusing on enabling its software to interact with .Net Web services but isn't going as far as supporting the infrastructure.

"We'll cooperate [with Microsoft on the standards, and compete on the implementation," Hebner says.

IBM also pointed out that Java is the more popular technology for enterprises buying Web services. In addition, the company cited a recent survey from analyst firm Giga Information Group that showed 32 percent of customers say WebSphere is the most important Web services platform, compared with 22 percent for Microsoft .Net.

Going forward, IBM says it will concentrate on developing standards with WS-I, which the company says has had membership inquiries from more than 450 companies, and offering solution providers and software developers more resources and support through its partner program and new partner initiative, WebServices on WebSphere.