Marimba's ''ISV Solutions'' Speed Time to Market and Reduce Support Costs for Independent Software Vendors

Business Wire, Oct 15, 2001

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 15, 2001

Marimba Enables ISVs to Distribute, Update,

and Manage Software Over the Internet

Marimba, Inc. (Nasdaq:MRBA), a leading provider of systems management solutions built for e-business, today announced "ISV Solutions," a management solution for independent software vendors (ISVs), such as InterVideo, Intuit, KANA, MusicMatch, and Selectica. Marimba's ISV Solutions, an extension to Marimba's core Change Management products, provide consumer and enterprise software vendors with the necessary tools to create self-updating applications. By embedding self-update capabilities into their applications, Marimba is able to provide ISVs with a competitive edge in terms of reduced support costs and delivering new products and features to market.

"Both consumers and enterprises benefit when ISVs are able to self-update their products," said Neal Goldman, research director at the Yankee Group. "Consumers like the process to be simple and transparent, while enterprises can spend less time worrying about pushing out updates internally or to end-customers."

"With the advent of the Internet, software users have become accustomed to getting the latest, most feature-rich software at the click of a button. That trend toward instant service will continue, and ISVs may soon find that the competitive landscape for their software includes its ability to be seamlessly delivered, updated, and managed," said Fred Broussard, senior research analyst at IDC in Framingham, Mass. "ISVs that don't recognize the value of this functionality could soon find themselves losing deals on the basis of serviceability and supportability. Marimba is bringing to market a solution set that provides ISVs with the ability to embed self-managing and updating functionality into their applications. Those that take advantage of it could quickly differentiate themselves from competitors."

As ISVs compete in their respective markets, the ones who are able to effectively update and manage their software in the field will establish a competitive advantage. ISVs are always looking for ways to reduce their time to market and reduce support costs. Marimba's ISV Solutions provide software vendors with a transparent delivery mechanism for application updates that will allow them to transition their business model to a subscription-based, software-as-a-service model, where new features and services are delivered regularly over the Web.

Reduce Support and Media Duplication Costs

ISVs are constantly looking to automate their software updating process and replace manual intervention. Marimba's built-in self-healing virtually eliminates the painful and oftentimes cumbersome process of self-service updating, a practice that requires users to locate and download the application update from the ISV Web site. Another method of updating is to physically create and mail out a CD or diskette to the end-customer. Marimba's ISV Solutions reduces the need to create these physical CDs or diskette's, reduces human error in a failed manual update, and ultimately reduces support calls by facilitating a better end-customer product.

"Having the ability to virtually eliminate the shipping of thousands of CDs to enterprise customers is a significant cost savings for us," said Fabio Angelillis, executive vice president of engineering at KANA. "In addition, we expect the proactive delivery of updates by Marimba's ISV Solutions to greatly increase our user-adoption success rate."

Speed Products to Market

Marimba's ISV Solutions can speed time to market in two ways. First and foremost, the Marimba updating solution allows a software vendor to focus on their core product line instead of designing, developing, maintaining, and enhancing an update management solution as robust and scalable as Marimba's. The second manner in which Marimba speeds time to market is by allowing an ISV to release their solution and updates earlier. Rather than extending the development cycle to include every key feature, Marimba allows a vendor to deliver a product to market quickly with a core set of features. Once in the field, an initial update will bring the application up to the most current revision. Then, over time, additional new features and services can be delivered in a seamless and transparent manner.

Improved Quality of Service

Marimba's ISV Solutions increase customer retention by seamlessly providing new features and services to the end-user. The customer/vendor relationship is enhanced, because the product can be customized and continually refreshed throughout the lifecycle of the relationship. Continual delivery of new features and services also enables the ISV to react quickly to competitive pressures and to reduce the potential loss of a customer to a competitive solution.

Successful Customers

"Marimba's ISV Solutions allow us to perform automatic and seamless updates to our customers," said Bill Caid, vice president of engineering for MusicMatch. "As a result, MusicMatch can deliver enhanced services to all MusicMatch Jukebox customers with the latest version of our software, and can support the Web-based delivery of new personalized services that improve their music listening experiences."