Microsoft Corp. announced availability of the first draft specifications of the BizTalk Framework, a new BizTalk.Org Web site and charter members of the BizTalk steering committee. These BizTalk Framework initiatives aim to accelerate the widespread adoption of XML for electronic commerce and application integration. Draft specifications for BizTalk Framework Tags and BizTalk Framework Documents have been published on the BizTalk.Org Web site at www.biztalk.org/. The draft BizTalk Framework specifications outline XML design guidelines for developing and implementing BizTalk Framework schemas and provide organizations with an initial blueprint for building BizTalk-enabled software. The BizTalk steering committee, composed of industry-leading vendors, standards bodies and corporate customers, will independently manage the BizTalk.Org Web site and provide guidance on the future direction of the BizTalk Framework. Charter members include American Petroleum Institute, Ariba Inc., The Baan Co., The Boeing Co., Commerce One Inc., Concur Technologies Inc., Data Interchange Standards Association (DISA), J.D. Edwards, Merrill Lynch & Company Inc., Microsoft, Open Applications Group (OAG), PeopleSoft Inc., Pivotal Software Inc. and SAP AG. The BizTalk.Org Web site serves as an open repository for the submission and publication of BizTalk Framework schemas that will allow organizations to easily integrate applications and exchange documents such as product catalogs, purchase orders, and product and promotional information. This Web site will serve as the online reference for BizTalk Framework specifications, schemas, reference materials, tools, sample applications and a community newsgroup. www.microsoft.com/industry/biztalk.

Excalibur Technologies announced that it has signed an integration and OEM agreement with Progressive Technology Federal Systems, Inc. (PTFS). The agreement calls for PTFS to integrate Excalibur RetrievalWare, Excalibur’s high performance search and retrieval application, into PTFS’s AVATAR Digital Asset Management System (ADAMS). ADAMS is a Web based solution for archiving, managing, retrieving and disseminating 100% of an organization’s digital assets ranging from archived photographs, rare books, full text imaged and electronic documents, digital video/audio, and virtually any type of digital object. www.ptfs.com, www.excalib.com

webMethods, Inc., announced at the Open Buying on the Internet (OBI) Consortium’s Quarterly Members Meeting that the company has joined the OBI Consortium, a non-profit organization dedicated to developing open standards for business-to-business e-commerce. webMethods will include support for OBI in the 3.0 release of webMethods B2B, which will be released mid-summer. As an OBI Consortium member, webMethods will collaborate with Intelisys to champion future OBI support for the XML. Together, webMethods and Intelisys will deliver the combined benefits of XML and OBI to buyers and suppliers that want to implement B2B e-commerce solutions and automate business procurement over the Internet. The OBI Consortium is a non-profit organization dedicated to developing open standards for business-to-business Internet commerce. Membership in the Consortium is open to buying and selling organizations, technology companies, financial institutions, and other interested parties on an annual fee basis. The Consortium provides a forum for standards development, education, and compliance certification. www.openbuy.org

Travel suppliers from the air, car and hotel industries with the support of the Air Transport Association (ATA) and The Hotel Electronic Distribution Network Association (HEDNA), announce the formation of the Open Travel Alliance (the Alliance). The Alliance is a travel industry group, assembled to create and promote new electronic commerce standards that improve the way information is exchanged between suppliers, distributors and consumers. This new initiative, led by air, car and hotel suppliers, has set as its initial goal the delivery of a directory of common industry data labels to be exchanged among the travel supplier, distributor, and customer reservations computer systems. The Alliance’s goal is to include participation from air, car, hotel and other travel suppliers, but also global distribution systems and travel agencies, as well as many other developers of travel-oriented products and services. Open communication standards between the industries, developed by the Alliance, will facilitate a cost-effective exchange of information and will ultimately reduce duplication of efforts and create new innovative distribution opportunities. One of the Alliance’s first steps in moving toward this goal is the creation of an “open” set of standard XML definitions to facilitate communication between users. This “thesaurus” of terms will allow users to choose how they communicate between systems. Companies currently participating in the Open Travel Alliance are: Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Continental Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Midwest Express Airlines, Northwest Airlines, Trans World Airlines, United Airlines, Vanguard Airlines, Bass Hotels and Resorts, Hilton Hotels, Hyatt Corporation, Marriott International, Sterling Hotels, Swissotel, Alamo Rent A Car, Avis Rent A Car, Budget Rent-A-Car, Dollar Rent A Car Systems, Inc., Hertz Corporation, National Car Rental and Thrifty Car Rental. www.opentravel.com

Objectivity, Inc. announced that Netcentric Solutions Ltd, selected Objectivity/DB to serve as the database engine in its new Web content management solution, Lychee. Netcentric debuts Lychee today at the Webmaster trade show, Stand 144, in London Olympia, U.K.. Netcentric developed Lychee to remove the bottleneck in the flow of information to the Web by allowing users to publish information on their Internet, intranet, or extranet sites quickly and easily. Through the use of templates, Netcentric’s Lychee enables non-technical information owners to maintain specific areas of a Web site. The information follows the normal document workflow channels and is immediately updated on all relevant Web pages after sign-off. This ensures the timely publication of quality Web documents. Prior to using Objectivity/DB, Netcentric used its own file system, which was unable to deliver the performance or the scalability the company needed long-term. To optimize performance, Netcentric determined that Lychee, which is written in Java, needed an object database. Netcentric evaluated several object databases and selected Objectivity/DB for its performance, distribution and scalability. www.netcentric-solutions.com

iManage and West Group announced that the iManage LegalOffice Document Management System (DMS) now will be able to access Westlaw through westlaw.com, West Group’s web-based legal research service. This will give iManage users instant Internet access to Westlaw, the legal research service, while working within the DMS. With the completion of the integration, users of iManage LegalOffice will be able to conduct research on Westlaw without leaving the DMS, find the needed information and then import it directly back into the DMS. Once uploaded into iManage LegalOffice, users can manipulate the research text as if it were any other document within the DMS. iManage LegalOffice customers looking to take advantage of westlaw.com will be able to do so in second half of this year. www.imanage.com

MicroScript Corporation announced that it has endorsed and will support Microsoft’s BizTalk standards initiative for cross platform integration in e-commerce. MicroScript Corporation, whose Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) development tools are based on Microsoft’s ActiveX/COM/DCOM architecture, is used for application integration in healthcare and other markets. BizTalk is a new cross-platform e-commerce framework that makes it easy for businesses to integrate applications and conduct business over the Internet with trading partners and customers. The BizTalk framework is based on new XML schemas and industry standards that enable integration across industries and between business systems, regardless of platform, operating system or underlying technology. www.microscript.com

Sterling Commerce, Inc. unveiled its new GENTRAN Web Suite, a family of Web integration components designed to enable business process integration reliably and securely via the Internet. Through partnerships with webMethods and Cyclone Software, Sterling Commerce will add two new components, Real-time Integration and Internet Data Exchange, to GENTRAN Web Suite. Internet Data Exchange — Developed in partnership with Cyclone Software, facilitates simplified inter-enterprise messaging because it can communicate with other interoperable solutions that support the S/MIME and EDIINT standards. Real-time Integration — Via the new partnership with webMethods, uses XML to enable an organization to integrate its business applications with the Web sites, ERP applications and business systems of its partners. www.sterlingcommerce.com