PRESS PLATINUM and Informix Form Strategic Partnership

PLATINUM and Informix Form Strategic Partnership; PLATINUM to Support Informix Database With Its System Management Tools Oakbrook Terrace, IL, February 27, 1995 -- PLATINUM technology, inc., and Informix Software, Inc. today announced a joint technical and marketing alliance whereby PLATINUM will offer its powerful database management tools on INFORMIX-OnLine Dynamic Server. The availability of PLATINUM's product offerings will assist customers in monitoring and managing Informix's databases in a client/server environment. The strategic relationship enrolls PLATINUM into Informix's InSync Program for independent software vendors (ISVs). Informix InSync partners deliver a wide variety of products that enhance and expand the capabilities of Informix-based database servers and tools. PLATINUM has immediate plans to enable its growing client/server product line -- especially those tools that concentrate on the management of mission critical data -- to exploit the benefits of Informix's database products. Among the many products to support Informix are: o DBVision: PLATINUM's premier database performance management tool. DBVision helps improve DBAs' effectiveness by providing centralized management of distributed database systems. It provides 24-by-7 performance monitoring with configurable alarming, notification, and automatic problem solving. o Desktop DBA: a Windows-based database tool for managing heterogeneous database environments. It provides administrators and developers the ability to perform all routine DBA tasks from a single screen including SQL script editing and task grouping. o SQL Spy: PLATINUM's Windows-based database performance management tool that allows database developers and administrators to monitor database events, usages, and results, which can beused for performance optimization. "Informix is fast becoming the leader at the high end of UNIX," said Andrew J. Filipowski, PLATINUM's CEO. "The timing is right for us to provide our best-of-breed database management tools for Informix customers. With the addition of Informix support, our client/server offerings will address all the most popular RDBMSs on the market today." Informix customers agree with Filipowski. "We rely on PLATINUM's tools to keep our mainframe environment up and running efficiently," states Scott Franz, lead DBA analyst for The Musicland Group in Minneapolis. "And as an Informix customer, we are looking forward to seeing PLATINUM's tools enabled for Informix." "Informix is being deployed in large enterprises, handling hundreds of gigabytes of data on widely disparate hardware platforms. PLATINUM will provide Informix customers the administrative tools necessary to monitor and manage this complex environment," said Steve Sommer, vice president of marketing at Informix. "This announcement underlies our commitment to working with the leading system management vendors to bring best-of-breed tools to our customers." Availability The products will be available beginning in Q2 1995. About INFORMIX-OnLine Dynamic Server INFORMIX-OnLine Dynamic Server is Informix's powerful, multithreaded database server designed to exploit the capabilities of both symmetric multiprocessor (SMP) and uniprocessor architectures to deliver breakthrough database scalability, manageability, and performance. OnLine Dynamic Server's core technology is based on Informix's Dynamic Scalable Architecture (DSA), the goal of which is to provide the most effective parallel database architecture available to help users manage increasingly larger, more complex databases while substantially improving overall system performance and scalability. A number of major corporations have standardized on INFORMIX-OnLine Dynamic Server for enterprise wide applications. The most recent companies to do so include GTE, Sears, and Yamaha Motor Corp. About Informix Informix Software is the leading supplier of high performance, parallel processing database technology for open systems. The company's database servers are the number one choice of computer hardware manufacturers for publishing Transaction Processing Council (TPC) benchmarks for UNIX-based systems. Informix products also include application development tools for creating client/server production applications, decision support systems, and ad-hoc query interfaces, and connectivity software that allows information to be shared transparently from PCs to mainframes within the corporate computing environment. Informix's corporate headquarters is based in Menlo Park, California. About PLATINUM PLATINUM's alliance with Informix comes on the heels of several large announcements that establish both companies as leaders in database technology and systems management. Most recently, PLATINUM announced its pending acquisition of BrownStone Solutions to expand its data warehousing solution set, and its plans to create the P.O.E.M.S. (PLATINUM Open Enterprise Management System) environment for systems management integration. To this end, PLATINUM additionally acquired ViaTech, the maker of an enterprise software distribution tools, and AutoSystems, the provider of a UNIX job scheduler. An essential part of PLATINUM's systems management strategy is to provide best-of-breed database management tools for the open computing environment, of which Informix is a vital component. == -- %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% William Daul Advanced Support INFORMIX SOFTWARE INC. 4100 Bohannon Dr. (415) 926-6488 - wk Menlo Park, CA. 94025 uunet!infmx!billd or billd@informix.com