ACADEMIA

The Itanium Solutions Alliance has announced that leading enterprise infrastructure software vendor Sybase has become a charter member of the organization. Sybase joins Arkeia, Insyde Technology, Platform Solutions, Secure64 and SWSoft who have also joined the organization since its launch in September. The Alliance was formed to boost availability of Itanium solutions through delivery of a suite of enabling programs targeted at enterprise and technical computing developers. "Since the launch of the Itanium Solutions Alliance, industry interest in the group has been growing," said Henri Pfal, Bull's representative to the Itanium Solutions Alliance Steering Committee. "With delivery of Alliance Developer Days on track to initiate this month, the Alliance is well on its way to establishing a central focus for Itanium solutions delivery within the industry. We welcome the addition of Sybase as a natural fit to join this effort." At the launch of the Alliance, the group announced three programs that will accelerate application availability on Itanium platforms. The first is a series of one- to three-day Developer Days events. At these events developers will receive training and technical assistance from industry experts. In addition, they will have access to Itanium porting platforms and a suite of tools and compilers. The first of these events will take place Nov. 30-Dec. 2 in Santa Clara, Calif. Other events are planned for Dec. 14-16 in Tokyo and Feb. 6-9 in Paderborn, Germany. The second ISA program is a network of Solution Center Networks around the world. At this time the group has brought more than 20 of these networks together. Finally, the Itanium Solutions Catalog is expected to launch next month in the Alliance Website. Vendors are encouraged to submit applications to be included at the launch of the Solutions Catalog though the application submission tool. The news of new membership comes as the Alliance participates in the SC'05 event, the industry's premier technical computing conference. The Alliance will host a booth at the event as well as participate in the Gelato organization's birds of a feather session. Itanium solutions provide a compelling choice for technical computing environments with solutions that scale beyond mainframe alternatives meeting the most intense computing requirements.