Stories about: H&R Block

Implementing SOA can be an extremely expensive undertaking. You might need to purchase several products within the SOA stack like an enterprise service bus (ESB), a business process modeling (BPM) tool, a portal, a rules engine and a data services tool. But it doesn't stop there. There are additional tools for testing, SOA governance, security... and the list goes on and on. In addition to all the software, you need to budget for training, hardware, consulting and salaries.

A good CRM package does you no good if employees aren't willing to use it. Case in point: IMA Financial Group, a medium-sized financial services company based in the US. IMA had installed a commercial customer relationship management system that "was flexible and configurable and attractive on the front end," says business processes manager Jennifer Hallam.

I was standing in a spacious entryway, chatting with the chief science officer at Sun Microsystems. His short-cropped hair, V-neck sweater and glasses were a sure sign of technical prowess.

Laszlo Systems, a maker of Asynchronous JavaScript + XML technologies, has released a new framework that makes it easier for developers to place multiple applications in a single browser window and have the applications interact with each other, company officials said this week.

A pair of Silicon Valley-based open-source collaboration vendors has released new versions of their software at LinuxWorld, renewing their challenge to the dominance of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes by offering what they claim are cheaper, more flexible alternatives.