An article on TheStreet.com last week discusses BEAs position in the appserver market, claiming that some analysts feel they are getting "squeezed from both ends". On one side there are the large corporate vendors of IBM and Oracle, and on the other is the open source contingent of JBoss.

Read TheStreet.com's report on BEA getting squeezed from both ends.

Looks like stock analysts have opinions as divergent as developers.

Just a month ago there was a news post here in which a different analyst claimed BEA is well positioned for the future:

https://www.theserverside.com/home/thread.jsp?thread_id=17478.

BEA's position as stated in the article with regards to IBM,Oracle could be due to those vendors ability to provide complete set of infrastructure offerings and services.The deals could be better from one stop shop for large organisations.(page-2 ,enterprises simplyfying their infrastruc. with vendors)

Think,In today's economy,JBoss and other open source vendors are bound to play a significant role especially in running non-critical enterprise applications.


Onthe other side,With IBM and BEA recent offerings on medium and low end markets and open source platforms gaining widespread acceptance even with larger enterprises, wonder what will happen to little known and small app.server vendor(s)? crushed?

One of the divisions of General Electric recently announced they are replacing BEA's WebLogic with JBoss, and plan to do the same with several other divisions.

I think the price of WebLogic is totally out of control. And before people were rushing to use EJB just to use EJB. Now every industry is in cost cutting mode, and developers have learned that EJB is not necessary for a majority of projects. In any case I don't see BEA doing well. Tomcat & JBoss are very tough competitors to beat.

Michael

Do you have a reference (link) for the GE switch ?

It is mentioned in the article by Bill Snyder that is linked at the top of this thread.

Quote:
"In recent months, a number of major companies that would normally be BEA customers have adopted the JBoss application server. They include a supply division of General Electric, MCI WorldCom's provisioning arm, Electronic Arts and Corporate Express, according to Marc Fleury, founder of the JBoss Group, an Atlanta-based company that sells support and services to JBoss users."

So it appears to be based on a statement by Marc Fleury.

Thomas Risberg

Of course JBoss is going to get into accounts, even ones with big companies. Big companies have thousands of projects going on at the same time. Some WebSphere, some WebLogic, some 9ias, some JBoss, some Resin, some Tomcat, some IIS, some C++ on Unix, some VB ... the big question is the trend: Will the cost difference plus increased trust eventually allow JBoss (etc.) to penetrate the data center for critical line-of-business high-scale enterprise applications. I'd say yes, it's just a matter of time.

Assuming that's true, what companies will it impact the most? IBM? BEA? No: Both of them appear to be set in stone as the go-to vendors (like Oracle in the database world -- there are 10 open source databases that are good, but Oracle still sells lots of software.) The second tier app server vendors will probably get completely squeezed out of the "generic app server business" over time, because they neither have the "market leader" position nor the cost advantage. It's a shame, yes, because some are very competitive (both technology and business-wise), but IMHO if you don't think it will happen, you are ignoring history.

Peace,

Cameron Purdy
Tangosol, Inc.
Coherence: Easily share live data across a cluster!

I assume the "second tier app server vendors" you alluded to include some of the following:

Sun One (Netscape/NetDynamics/Forte)
HP (Bluestone)
SilverStream
Iona
Borland
Macromedia JRun
ATG Dynamo
GemStone/J
...

But as far as I am concerned, they were out of the equation some time ago. If JBoss is going to take away someone's market share, then BEA seems to be the next target.

As JBoss is maturing, and proving reliable,and user/developer community is growing, definitely it will take some accounts away from more pricey App.Servers.

but again, the products offered from IBM,BEA, Oracle gives a total soulution.(like App server, database,project management,etc.etc). so, this will help those companies to give an edge over JBoss even if they are very pricey.

But JBoss has made them to think very seriously. and thats a good sign for J2EE altogether. isn't?

<snip>The second tier app server vendors will probably get completely squeezed out of the "generic app server business" over time, because they neither have the "market leader" position nor the cost advantage<snip>

Absolutely.Some one whom I have seen 'here' claiming they compete head on with BEA,IBM,JBOSS so on and..blah,blah..enough..

I am hearing from many that the days are.. ...watch out!

shirke
India

People seem very focussed on the fate of BEA. They're perceived as the number one vendor and they charge appropriately, i.e. very high prices. Now serious competition is appearing at the high and low ends BEA is reacting by producing more higher end tools (WL Platform/Workshop) that they can still charge high prices for and more lower cost options (WL Express) for those who want the basics.

I'm sure no one at BEA *ever* imagined there would *never* be competition and they could just keep on selling the same product forever. BEA's business model seems to be that they are first (or close to first) to market with products that corporates feel they can trust. And when the competition comes in they change the focus to something else. The market is moving away from competing on J2EE support - that's the minimum you expect. Now people want good web services support and that's where the competition is going to be.

Will BEA thrive over the next decade? Who knows. But let's not pretend that BEA are doing anything particularly stupid here. What we are seeing is the market working as it should and BEA reacting as you'd expect.

Ian.

Companies are willing to pay for a mature support model and accountability. WebLogic has that over JBoss. Compared to Webshpere, I would argue WebLogic has worked out-of-the-box over several versions. Webshpere is getting better.

CORBA always talked about leveling the paying field by competing on quality of service. WebLogic does this very well. Maybe they will move towards the RedHat model.

It may right to say that BEA is facing tough competition rather than they are being squeezed.
After all, J2EE market is getting matured, and dedicated players are in.

IBM and Oracle got a big advantage of pre-established bit client base, where as BEA is not.
But still BEA is doing very well, thanks to their good product WebLogic.
And i dont see, any serious threat to BEA in near future.

After we have heard some conflicting opinions from the investment banking research analysts, let's read some more from people who are supposedly to know a little more about technology.

Hmm... $1.6 million in savings by choosing JBoss. That's pretty nice!