IBM To Acquire Isogon To Bolster Mainframe App Management Lineup

IBM will make Isogon's software products part of its Tivoli line of asset-management tools. The acquisition complements existing Tivoli products that help companies track their inventory and usage of applications running in distributed server environments.

A number of multinationals, including Nissan Motor Co. and Boise Cascade Co., use Isogon products. The company counts more than 200 customers worldwide. Research firm IDC estimates that spending on IT-asset-management tools will increase from $971 million in 2004 to $1.33 billion in 2009.

The Isogon purchase is the latest in a string of software acquisitions IBM has made in recent months. In May, the company closed its $1.1 billion acquisition of data-integration specialist Ascential Software. Also in May, it purchased Gluecode Software, a provider of subscription services that support open-source application servers such as Apache.

In a recent interview, IBM software chief Steve Mills said the company is looking to bolster the richness of its middleware offerings. "We're trying to get a very complete environment," Mills said, adding that more such acquisitions are a likely part of IBM's future. "Our acquisition pattern is going to follow the pattern of the past; we're in the middleware space."