Component/Object-Based Technology Allows Businesses to
Connect and "Network-Enable" Disparate Corporate
Applications
ATLANTA, January 27, 1999 -
MCI Systemhouse, MCI WorldCom's (NASDAQ:WCOM) global information
technology services company, announced today the availability of
EnterpriseConnect, a new global service suite aimed at helping
businesses meet the challenge of integrating diverse software
applications.
Delivered by MCI Systemhouse's Enterprise Application
Integration Solutions (EAIS) practice, EnterpriseConnect combines key
middleware technologies, industry partnerships and critical expertise
to integrate software packages, legacy systems and custom-built
applications, ensuring they are functional across a shared network
environment. By leveraging appropriate object technology, the solution
facilitates reuse, simplifies interaction between subsystems, allows
new components to "plug and play" with existing ones and
reduces maintenance costs. The EnterpriseConnect solution includes
middleware products from key alliance partners including Active
Software and IBM.
"Increasingly, customers are driven by the growing need to
integrate and leverage applications across the organization,"
noted Stuart Hammer, practice director, EAIS, MCI Systemhouse.
"The existence of legacy systems, combined with the proliferation
of packaged solutions and the escalating costs of integration make a
consistent, enterprise-wide integration strategy necessary.
EnterpriseConnect provides this strategy and enables organizations to
deliver integrated business functionality with seamless access by
connecting and network enabling a plethora of corporate
applications."
MCI Systemhouse clients in a variety of industry sectors, including
retail and government, can benefit from the high-quality, low-risk
EnterpriseConnect approach. In the fiercely competitive retail sector,
for example, there is an immediate and critical need to share common
customer data and current event information, from inventory to billing,
across a variety of packaged applications. In doing so, organizations
avoid needless duplication and inaccuracies and improve the timeliness
and level of service to customers, thus saving money while improving
efficiencies.
"MCI Systemhouse's EnterpriseConnect provides a
comprehensive solution that directly addresses market needs," said
Jim Green, chairman and CEO of Active Software, Inc. "As an
application integration software vendor, we look to leverage the
market-leading expertise of companies like MCI Systemhouse to deliver
complete solutions built upon our products. It's a winning
combination."
The new EnterpriseConnect solution works in conjunction with
EnterpriseComponent, another component/object-based solution from EAIS
that allows organizations to quickly build and reuse pre-built business
components and rapidly assemble Internet-enabled applications.
The EnterpriseComponent approach was recently employed to deliver an
award-winning project for the Manitoba Liquor Control Commission
(MLCC). The project used component/object technologies and techniques
to deliver an Internet storefront for placing orders. Through a
network-enabled business solution deployed throughout the enterprise,
MLCC now allows its customers to place, price, submit, process, bill
and ship orders online - speeding the process while minimizing clerical
errors. The project won a 1998 Object Management Group (OMG) Object
Application award in a category recognizing outstanding applications
that utilize reusable components.
EAIS - Delivering Integration Solutions
MCI Systemhouse's global EAIS practice assists clients in the
integration of diverse corporate applications, creating truly
enterprise-enabled solutions. The business practice leverages
component/object techniques and methodologies to build system
architectures that establish and preserve flexibility and extend the
capabilities of the corporation to employees, suppliers, partners and
customers.
EAIS is a leader in driving international industry standards,
chairing committees involved in the adoption of reusable object models.
As a result, the practice is at the forefront of the evolution of
object standards, with the vision to assist customers in using the
technology most effectively. EAIS architects have expertise in
delivering complex, object-enabled business applications with extensive
experience in Java, Event Brokers, CORBA and DCOM. EAIS has
successfully delivered projects in a variety of industry sectors
including government, finance, insurance, telecommunications and
manufacturing. Clients include State Farm Insurance, Carlson Companies
and Nations Bank (Bank of America).
MCI Systemhouse, The Network Enterprise Company, is MCI
WorldCom's global information technology services company. MCI
Systemhouse is one of the industry's only single-source providers
of convergence products and services that leverage the combined
telecommunications expertise of MCI WorldCom and the computer expertise
of MCI Systemhouse to enable businesses' total networking,
communications, consulting and outsourcing needs. The company has 120
offices and approximately 9,400 professionals worldwide. With a
comprehensive suite of network enabled IT solutions and services for
the new millennium, MCI Systemhouse serves major corporate, mid-sized
and public sector clients throughout North and South America, Europe
and Asia.
