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BEA Plans Open Source Project to Accelerate Java Adoption and Provide Universal Framework for Enterprise Java Applications SAN JOSE, Calif., May 19 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- http://bea.com/more_info.jsp?p=161&r=15.19.31 BEA Systems, Inc. , the world's leading application infrastructure software company, today announced plans to create an open-source project called "Beehive." Project Beehive is designed to be the industry's first easy-to- use, open source foundation for building service-oriented architecture (SOA) and enterprise Java-based applications. Based on the innovative application framework of BEA WebLogic Workshop(TM), Project Beehive is part of BEA's ongoing effort to simplify Java development and broaden accessibility. Through support for Project Beehive and membership in the BEA WebLogic Workshop Controls and Extensibility Program, more than 50 leading component, tool and platform vendors are committed to being part of the initial ecosystem supporting Beehive, helping to further BEA's commitment to ensuring investment protection for its customers, expanding the base of Java developers, and fostering new innovations through industry-wide collaboration.Project Beehive will be based on award-winning technology found in BEA WebLogic Workshop, including Java annotations, Java controls, Java Web services and Java Page Flows, which drive increased interoperability and developer productivity. Project Beehive leverages WebLogic Workshop's controls, reusable meta-data driven software components based on drag-and-drop technology that can easily integrate into BEA and other software platforms. In addition, Beehive also builds on BEA's innovative Web services programming capabilities that allow for easier consumption and management of services, and page flows, which can help developers quickly and easily define and view page transitions between applications. Project Beehive can attract new users to a simpler way to build enterprise Java applications, while also attracting experienced Java Web and J2EE programmers with a model that is designed to save them from writing the same Java plumbing code over and over again. Project Beehive is designed to fully complement commercial and open source IDEs, such as Eclipse, in that it offers an open-sourced application framework, or runtime environment, rather than a development environment. By open sourcing the application framework, developers and customers can create applications with their preferred tool and deploy them to any server, helping to assure IT investments are protected from future risk associated with vendor lock-in. "WebLogic Workshop consists of two major technologies: a powerful integrated development environment and an application framework to abstract many of the tedious tasks associated with Java development," said Scott Dietzen, CTO, BEA Systems. "By open sourcing the application framework, we can help provide a way for all Java developers, as well as our ISV partners, to build fully portable applications more productively, which creates immense business opportunities and future growth for the Java ecosystem. Time will prove these same technologies critical to the standardization of inter- application orchestration via work-flows and Web-flows." As part of the WebLogic Workshop Controls and Extensibility Program and Project Beehive support commitments, companies can be incorporated as part of the Beehive ecosystem, allowing them to quickly create reusable, portable components designed to be easily integrated into orchestrated applications and solutions. These companies include: Borland, Capgemini, Compuware, Intel, MySQL, Red Hat, Salesforce.com, and VERITAS. "Red Hat is pleased to see one of our major platform partners, BEA, embrace open source so aggressively," said Mike Evans, vice president of Strategic Alliances at Red Hat. "Project Beehive will enable faster innovation by opening up key pieces of the stack that complement and enhance already open components, like Tomcat, so that innovation isn't constrained by the Java Community Process. Working with BEA, Red Hat plans to include open source WebLogic framework runtime components in future product releases to help customers protect their existing Java investments while taking advantage of the flexibility and cost benefits of open source." Project Beehive is designed to run on Apache Tomcat -- the reference implementation for Java Servlet engines. With more than four million downloads of Tomcat since last year, Project Beehive can help multitudes of Tomcat customers scale their applications by easily connecting to industry-leading infrastructures such as BEA WebLogic Platform(TM). "As the industry leading open source database provider, mySQL welcomes the open sourcing of BEA's WebLogic Workshop framework," said Marten Mickos, CEO of mySQL. "We think this is a significant step forward toward the creation of an open source programming stack, and complements existing open source technologies around databases and middleware. The Workshop framework is a significant step forward in making J2EE application development easier, and BEA's decision to open source Workshop can now allow the entire J2EE/Java as well as the open source community to enjoy the ease-of-use and ease-of- development benefits of Workshop." Pricing and Availability Project Beehive is expected to be available this summer for free under an open-source license. For more information on Beehive, please visit http://dev2dev.bea.com/technologies/beehive/index.jsp BEA will continue to offer the BEA WebLogic Workshop IDE for free to developers. Developers who want to start immediately working with the Beehive programming model in combination with an IDE, can download the free edition of BEA WebLogic Workshop without obligation at http://commerce.bea.com/index.jsp. Legal Notice Regarding Forward-Looking Statements Some of the statements in this press release are forward-looking, including the statements regarding: the availability, plans delivery, goals, development, expected features, expected benefits and competitive position of BEA's Project Beehive products and technology (the "Beehive Products"). Actual results could differ materially from those expressed in any forward-looking statements. Risks and uncertainties BEA faces that could cause results to differ materially include risks associated with: any unforeseen technical difficulties or software errors related to the final development and launch of any Beehive Products or related services; any technological or standards changes in the application infrastructure market which could make BEA's Project Beehive less competitive or require feature changes in these products; and any slowdown in the adoption by businesses of open source technologies, Internet technologies or related standards. Readers should also refer to the risk disclosures set forth in BEA's 10-K for the year ended January 31, 2004 as filed with the SEC and subsequent reports filed thereafter from time-to- time with the SEC. The forward-looking statements contained in this release are made as of the date hereof, and BEA does not assume any obligation to update such statements nor the reasons why actual results could differ materially from those projected in such statements. About BEA BEA Systems, Inc. is the world's leading application infrastructure software company, providing the enterprise software foundation that allows thousands of companies to benefit from service-oriented architectures. With more than 15,000 customers around the world, including the majority of the Fortune Global 500, BEA and its WebLogic(R) and Tuxedo(R) brands are among the most trusted names in business. Headquartered in San Jose, Calif., BEA has 71 offices in 34 countries and is on the Web at http://www.bea.com/. BEA, Tuxedo, and WebLogic are registered trademarks and BEA WebLogic Enterprise Platform, BEA WebLogic Server, BEA WebLogic Integration, BEA WebLogic Portal, BEA WebLogic JRockit, BEA WebLogic Platform, BEA WebLogic Express, BEA WebLogic Workshop, BEA WebLogic Java Adapter for Mainframe, BEA Liquid Data for WebLogic, BEA eLink, and BEA WebLogic Enterprise Security are trademarks of BEA Systems, Inc. All other company and product names may be the subject of intellectual property rights reserved by third parties. Beehive Supporting Quotes Borland http://www.borland.com/ "As the leading cross-platform development tools vendor, Borland welcomes the release of the Workshop framework to the open source community," said George Paolini, vice president and general manager of Java solutions at Borland. "Borland's JBuilder and Together modeling solutions are complementary to the Workshop framework and combine to propel the success of the BEA WebLogic Platform. Now the community can work more easily to evolve the Workshop framework and broaden its appeal." Capgemini http://www.capgemini.com/ "As long-time proponents of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), Capgemini have continually been looking for tools and standards that enable the architectural vision of SOA to be more accurately reflected by the delivered system," said Steve Jones, Head of Enterprise Java Solutions at Capgemini. "BEA's release of their Beehive framework into the open source community represents a great step forward in enabling SOA to be put in the hands of developers. Capgemini believe that using a Beehive container for services can help drive software re-use and decrease development risk." Compuware http://www.compuware.com/ "As a strategic BEA partner, we're excited by BEA's contribution of the Workshop framework to the open source community allowing the entire J2EE industry to benefit from the Workshop programming model," said Bob Barker, vice president, Compuware. "We intend to leverage Beehive to extend our Workshop support across our developer solutions portfolio, particularly Compuware OptimalJ and its model-driven, pattern-based methodology. MDA and SOA together can make a powerful combination, and we think the open sourcing of the Workshop programming framework will accelerate the SOA adoption." Documentum http://www.documentum.com/ "Documentum welcomes BEA's move to open source its Workshop application framework as part of project Beehive," said Rob Tarkoff, executive vice president and chief strategy officer for Documentum, a division of EMC. "This can enable the .NET-like productivity benefits of the Workshop framework to be made available to the broader Java/J2EE community. We're particularly excited because it can help expand the market opportunity for investments we have already made in developing Documentum controls for Workshop, which are included with every Workshop download." Instantiations http://www.instantiations.com/ "As an Eclipse member, Instantiations welcomes BEA's decision to open source the Workshop application framework. We believe this contribution is complementary to the open tools framework provided by the Eclipse ecosystem and we think BEA's decision will create new opportunities for Eclipse developers," said Mike Taylor, CEO of Instantiations. "The further adoption of, and collaboration between, open tools and programming frameworks can ultimately benefit customers. Eclipse users will most certainly benefit from BEA's significant contribution." Intel http://www.intel.com/ "Intel sees the value in the open source movement and as such we welcome BEA's innovative move in open sourcing the WebLogic Workshop application framework," said Melissa Laird, general manager of Intel's Software Enabling Division. "We see Beehive as a means to enable faster and more widespread development of enterprise J2EE applications for deployment on industry- standard platforms, especially Intel(R) Itanium(R) and Xeon(TM) processor- based servers, the platform of choice for application development and deployment. This initiative complements Intel's alliance with BEA which has resulted in BEA WebLogic JRockit, an enterprise-class Java Virtual Machine (JVM) optimized to run on Intel, and a key enabler for enterprise Java applications on Windows and Linux." The Middleware Company http://www.middleware-company.com/ "BEA's Beehive initiative can create visibility, awareness and broader adoption of J2EE technology," said Salil Deshpande, CEO of research and media firm, The Middleware Company. "BEA's move into open source is a bold action that will change the way the middleware industry thinks about developer productivity and satisfaction." Salesforce.com http://www.salesforce.com/ "Salesforce.com is extending its work with the open source community to include support for BEA's new Workshop framework," said Peter Gassner, SVP and GM, sforce Products Division, salesforce.com. "Salesforce.com and BEA share a common vision of the role of the Service Oriented Architecture in the enterprise. By making it easier to integrate the sforce Web service with J2EE applications, this new framework can enhance sforce's position as a leader in bringing the benefits of SOAs to enterprises of all sizes." VERITAS http://www.veritas.com/ "The BEA Service Oriented Architecture approach in conjunction with VERITAS' utility computing software can provide a platform for the development, deployment and operating support of enterprise applications, helping to enable higher service levels with better manageability and lower total cost of ownership," said Robert Soderbery, vice president of business development, VERITAS. "BEA's move to open source the Workshop framework can further strengthen the BEA and VERITAS heterogeneous solution by enabling VERITAS to leverage the WebLogic Workshop control to extend functionality, in order to create greater IT adaptability in response to business requirements." BEA Systems, Inc. CONTACT: Susan Siegel of BEA SYSTEMS, INC., +1-408-570-8364 [email protected]; or Brooke Chilen of Bite Communications, +1-415-365-0397or [email protected], for BEA SYSTEMS, INC. Web site: http://www.bea.com/ |