Fiorano backs Web services spec

Fiorano Software is adding support for BPEL (Business Process Execution Language), a Microsoft- and IBM-driven specification for linking business processes via Web services, to its enterprise service bus product.

Fiorano ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) is a peer-to-peer platform for implementing standardized interfaces for inter-application communication, transformation, portability, and security. It is based on Java Message Service. Version 3.5, due to ship on March 15, boasts BPEL support, the company said.

In Fiorano's implementation of BPEL, the company's peer-to-peer architecture enables reuse of existing, single-processor Intel-based computers without having to use a more costly four- to eight-processor box as a central hub, said Fiorano's CEO and CTO Atul Saini.

"We're allowing a single BPEL process to execute across multiple nodes on a network,"  Saini said.

"You don't need eight-CPU boxes anymore," to serve as a central hub, he added. BPEL, Saini said, enables enterprise managers to get a view of the distributed businesses that they have.

A customer of Fiorano, health care system provider Doc IT, plans to use Fiorano ESB to integrate its own application with hospitals' systems.

"It gave us the most versatility to be able to tie into the other databases and applications that we need without having to change an entire hospital or clinic. A lot of doctors or groups want to keep certain segments of their enterprise systems and we’re able to tie into that system and push and pull messages in and out of it," said Jim Hostick, director of corporate planning and product development at the company.

Also featured in Version 3.5 are grid computing support and improved Web services and JMS functions. Version 4 of ESB, due this summer, adds dynamic configuration management. With this functionality, "you can move an entire business process [from] development to QA to production at a click of a button," Saini said. "You don’t need ClearCase or Rational [product]."

ESB 3.5 ships on March 15 and costs from $100,000 for a midsized enterprise to as much as $250,000 for a large enterprise.

Fiorano on March 15 also will ship Version 7.2 of its JMS product, FioranoMQ, which features improved reliability and speed. The product serves as the underlying foundation for the ESB but also is sold as a stand-alone product, priced at $7,500 per CPU.