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Strategies & Market Trends : The New Economy and its Winners -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (23780)	3/25/2005 12:46:34 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 57684

The Aldus Adobe Merger _____________________________ September 1994 wohl.com Aldus and Adobe have finally merged, after a series of negotiations which came perilously close to collapsing, and required Aldus to release the Freehand graphics product which it markets under license from Altsys Corporation, after Altsys claimed that it would be unfairly hampered by Adobe's competing product Illustrator. This merger is all about electronic publishing and creates a company that is not only one of the largest software vendors (their combined revenues for last year would have been about $520 Million, putting them in the big five with Microsoft, Lotus, and Novell), but surely the only large vendor of electronic publishing software. Aldus has long specialized in electronic publishing software, with both its very successful desktop publishing product PageMaker, and a number of specialty products for graphics artists. Adobe brings PostScript, Illustrator, and Acrobat to the table. In some sense, this merger is all about Acrobat. Adobe hopes to establish it as a broad standard for the exchange of documents. So far, that hasn't happened. But if it is sold in conjunction with PageMaker, a standard for electronic publishing, as documents are distributed electronically (rather than on paper), Acrobat could become much better known. In its hopes to be a standard, Acrobat has to compete with a number of other products including Interleaf's WorldView and KeyData's KeyView. We'll offer you a separate article on these products soon. The merger will give Aldus a safe harbor (founder and chairman Paul Brainerd wanted to resign) and will help Adobe find a source for revenue to make up for diminishing growth as HP's PLC program competes with Adobe's PostScript for market share. Aldus has focused on the marketing of software, so they may be a good match for Adobe (which is largely a technology empire), helping them, for instance, with sales in Europe, where Aldus is much stronger.

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (23780)	3/25/2005 12:51:48 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 57684

Amy Wohl: Candid opinions about the technology industry amywohl.weblogger.com

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (23780)	3/26/2005 1:08:48 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 57684

Kazeon Comes Out _______________________ By Mary Jander Site Editor Byte and Switch March 15, 2005 byteandswitch.com Another startup focused on helping organizations with unstructured data storage has emerged from stealth. Kazeon Inc. says its out-of-band solution for identifying and organizing email, MP3 music files, image files, Excel charts, Office documents, and the like, is in beta testing with an unspecified number of companies and will be generally available by mid-2005. Kazeon is one of a tiny number of companies focused on helping IT get a better handle on burgeoning data that can no longer be easily thrown away. Like StoredIQ, which announced its own plans in this area in January (see Deepfile Becomes StoredIQ), Kazeon will peer into the content of unstructured files and create searchable metadata that enables IT managers to locate what they need to save. The software will also feature automation capabilities, the company claims. Details are sketchy. But according to VP of marketing Troy Toman (ex-Veritas), Kazeon will look to differentiate itself from StoredIQ and others by ease of implementation, scaleability, and document management applications. He also says Kazeon's solution will have no agents, implying that it will be an appliance-based solution like StoredIQ's. The problem of managing unstructured data is being addressed by a range of larger companies, often as part of their information lifecycle management (ILM) wares. But firms like Kazeon and StoredIQ aim to get a jump on big players with products that offer detail, automation, and a range of management options that aren't tied to a specific platform. The newbies are also looking at expanding the range of applications beyond the basics. StoredIQ, for example, plans to start offering applications designed to search files for specific words linked to vertical industries such as healthcare. The market should allow plenty of room for at least a handful of startups. According to Toman, analyst estimates for the percentage of unstructured data in most organizations ranges from 65 percent to 80 percent, and most see a market potential in excess of $1 billion. Kazeon was founded in 2003 by Sudhakar Muddu, formerly CEO of Sanera, which was acquired by McData Corp. (Nasdaq: MCDTA - message board) for $102 million in 2003 (see McData Completes Sanera Acquisition). The company has $17 million in funding from Clearstone Venture Partners, Goldman Sachs & Co., and Redpoint Ventures. Toman says there are no current plans for more funding. Though Kazeon developed its product mostly domestically at its Mountain View, Calif., headquarters, Toman says plans are underway to expand the team with an office in Bangalore, India.