Microsoft Corp. announced the release to manufacturing, pricing and licensing of Microsoft BizTalk Server 2000. The latest release in the Microsoft .NET Enterprise Server family, BizTalk Server 2000 is a comprehensive solution that unites enterprise application integration, B2B integration and BizTalk Orchestration technology to allow companies to easily build dynamic business processes that span applications and organizational boundaries. Enterprise Edition. BizTalk Server 2000 Enterprise Edition is targeted at large organizations, trading hubs and digital marketplaces and has support for integrating unlimited internal applications with unlimited trading partners over the Internet. BizTalk Server 2000 Enterprise Edition will support multiple processor and clustering deployments to handle even the largest transaction volumes. The suggested retail price for BizTalk Server 2000 Enterprise Edition is $24,999 per CPU. Standard Edition. BizTalk Server 2000 Standard Edition is targeted at small and medium-sized organizations and has support for integrating up to five internal applications with up to five external trading partners, such as exchanges or digital marketplaces. Intended for small to medium-sized transaction volumes, the standard edition will not have support for multiprocessor or clustered deployments. The suggested retail price of BizTalk Server 2000 Standard Edition is $4,999 per CPU. BizTalk Server 2000 is scheduled to be generally available in January 2001. Microsoft today also published the final version of its BizTalk Framework 2.0 specification. Based on industry standards for data exchange and security such as SOAP 1.1, XML and S/MIME, the BizTalk Framework enables the secure and reliable exchange of business documents over the Internet. Development of the BizTalk Framework is overseen by the BizTalk Steering Committee, which comprises industry partners, consortiums and standards bodies. www.microsoft.com