Sun Microsystems Executive
To Head Venture With AOL
By a WALL STREET JOURNAL Staff Reporter
PALO ALTO, Calif -- Sun Microsystems Inc. and America Online Inc. agreed to name a Sun
executive to lead their electronic-commerce alliance, suggesting that Sun now effectively controls
much of the former Netscape Communications Corp.
The new Sun-AOL alliance encompasses key parts of Sun and the
former Netscape that have focused on developing Internet-based
software for Web servers and corporate networks. The alliance,
effectively a new business organization, will be run by Mark Tolliver, a
Sun executive who previously headed up Sun's consumer and
embedded-products division.
Although the partners also named two former Netscape executives and another Sun manager to
top positions in the venture, analysts saw Mr. Tolliver's ascension as a clear sign that Sun is taking
control of Netscape's electronic-commerce business -- particularly its "middleware" software
products used to manage data across corporate networks.
"AOL and Sun effectively had a joint takeover of Netscape," said David Wu, an analyst with ABN
Amro Inc. "AOL isn't really a technology company, so to have Sun manage the middleware part of
Netscape is a pretty logical thing for them to do."
Mr. Tolliver disputed that point, noting that he will report to a board of executives from AOL, of
Dulles, Va., and Sun. The organization "had to be staffed by some body," he said. "That board will
hold me and our team responsible for hitting the operating plan they approve."
The first big challenge for the new alliance will be to merge the product lines of Sun and the former
Netscape, which overlap in several respects. Mr. Tolliver wouldn't describe those plans, which the
partners plan to announce next week. But he said the product duplication is "good news" for the
alliance.
"We have the opportunity to take people from both organizations, point them together, and have
them work on a single product rather than two," he said. But he added that "we've got a lot more
communication to do around those kind of questions" concerning integration. |
