IBM and Novell Team Up To Deliver E-Commerce Solutions

IBM (NYSE: IBM) and Novell (Nasdaq: NOVL) announced Monday that the companies have partnered to make IBM’s e-business and e-commerce solutions available to the more than 92 million users of Novell’s Netware operating system.

It was a busy day for Novell, which also announced on Monday that it has released a new Internet caching system for e-commerce businesses and that Dell (Nasdaq: DELL) has signed up as a customer.

“As companies implement graphic-intensive Web sites and the overall demand for Web-based content increases, caching will become necessary at every Web server and major router segment to maintain response times,” said Ron Heinz, senior vice president for worldwide sales at Novell. Heinz boldly positioned Novell’s new Internet Caching System as “the only solution that delivers the performance foundation necessary for e-business.”

Shares of Novell closed up 1-1/16 to 27-1/4 on Monday after the news.

IBM Announces New E-Commerce Services

Shares of IBM fell 5/8 to $167 (US$) on an overall bad day for technology stocks, but there’s a lot of good news about IBM this week. Today, IBM announced extensive networking hardware services and security solutions for online businesses. IBM says it now offers the most complete single-vendor offering of networking hardware and services in the industry.

“To become an e-business, customers must address a variety of issues about doing business on the Internet — reliability, security, efficiency, speed and cost are among them,” said Jim Pertzborn, general manager of IBM’s networking hardware division. “IBM is the only company that can provide solutions that cover all those needs and concerns, and what we are announcing today is at the very core of that effort.”

Deal with Novell is Significant

But IBM’s deal with Novell could be the most significant news. The standard edition of IBM’s WebSphere, a leading Java-based Web application server, which includes Web site management tools, will now be included in Netware. Novell will also be able to sell the advanced edition of WebSphere, which helps allow Web sites to set up secure business transactions.

“This agreement is significant in providing customers the support they need to conduct Web-based business activity,” said John Swainson, general manager for application and integration middleware at IBM. “With IBM’s WebSphere products, Novell can now provide its NetWare customers the technology to quickly transform into e-businesses.”