BMC Set to Introduce New Strategy, Products

BMC's Enterprise Performance Assurance strategy will offer management and analysis tools to better monitor and control their IT infrastructure. The company plans to expand and combine current solutions and platforms as well as introduce new products, such as Patrol Perceive, a Web-based data access solution that can be quickly installed and accessed via Internet browsers. David Wagner, director of product marketing and Enterprise Performance Assurance at BMC, says Patrol Perceive will act as an entry-level version of the company's Patrol enterprise systems management platform. "Customers all over are trying to regain control of their systems," Wagner said. "Enterprise systems management has become rocket science stuff. Patrol Perceive brings the bar down."

In addition, BMC plans to integrate its Mainview solutions for mainframes and Patrol solutions for distributed systems. Under that umbrellas, the Houston-based software maker also plans to roll out two other new products at the end of the month that further strengthen the company's ties to IBM and the eServer product line. Mainview Performance Assurance, under the Mainview mainframe solutions, will offer predictive analysis and performance reporting capabilities to IBM zSeries mainframes running Linux. "Linux is a growing area for us. IBM has invested a billion dollars in Linux, and we're happy to ride that wave," Wagner said.

BMC will also unveil Patrol for iSeries-Predict, an extension of the company's Patrol solutions for IBM's AS/400 systems. The iSeries-Predict solution, which will be co-marketed and sold through IBM's eServer and Global Services divisions as well as select IBM Business Partners, is designed to anticipate changes or maintenance for the iSeries before problems occur.

By December, BMC plans to have full Web services capabilities for the Patrol Performance Assurance solutions featuring agent-less management technologies. Pricing for Patrol Perceive starts at $20 for Windows desktops and $40 for Unix desktops. Mainview Performance Assurance, which will be available at the end of the month, will start at $3,900. Patrol for iSeries-Predict, also available at the end of the month, will start at $350.