Fair Isaac Introduces Blaze Advisor for Microsoft .NET

Business Wire, Nov 4, 2004

MINNEAPOLIS -- Adoption of Microsoft .NET Technologies Allows Deployment of Leading Business Rules Solution across All Leading Platforms to Achieve Unprecedented Return on Investment

Fair Isaac Corporation (NYSE:FIC), the leading provider of analytics and decision technology, today announced the general availability of Blaze Advisor for .NET, a robust rules management solution that capitalizes on the Microsoft .NET Framework to expand the enterprise reach of Fair Isaac's business rules capabilities.

Microsoft .NET is software that connects people, information, systems and devices through the use of Web services. Blaze Advisor for .NET enables businesses to incorporate a rules decisioning system that co-exists with and upgrades existing applications, regardless of platform or programming language. Companies can design, deploy, execute and maintain business rules and policies as part of an automated business strategy application to achieve rapid ROI without being restricted by current and future technology investments.

"Fair Isaac's adoption of the .NET Framework demonstrates a commitment to providing customers with an application development platform that capitalizes on current and future .NET innovations," said Peter McKiernan, lead product manager for the Developer and Platform Evangelism Group at Microsoft Corp. "As a Microsoft Certified Partner, Fair Isaac is ensuring that its offering is tightly aligned with Microsoft technology. Blaze Advisor for .NET will help our mutual customers take full advantage of their existing solutions, unlock key data, and equip enterprises to harness the power and flexibility of .NET technologies."

Blaze Advisor for .NET was specifically developed for Fair Isaac's large-scale national and multinational clients who have a number of heterogeneous platforms and legacy systems using multiple programming languages. With true cross-platform support ranging from COBOL to Java, Blaze Advisor for .NET becomes an open solution that allows companies to easily modernize their enterprise decision systems while continuing to leverage existing applications.

Henry Morris, Group Vice President and General Manager for Integration, Development and Application Strategies at IDC, commented, "Enterprises continue to inquire about what technology strategy they should adopt. Application development platforms that remain open to numerous technologies and which support .NET, Java and other proprietary vendor technologies will be embraced by CIOs. Open application development tools will emerge as the standard for technology investments as they empower business strategy rather than constrict it."

"As one of the largest mortgage field services companies in the U.S., our integration of Blaze Advisor within the .NET environment allows us to extend the life of our existing mission-critical applications and improve business processing across the organization," said Mark Davis, development manager at First American Field Services. "First American Field Services has re-engineered our core systems leveraging .NET for presentation and workflow and Blaze Advisor for business rule implementation and management. Blaze Advisor allows us to meet government regulations presented by HUD and provide consistent responses and improved decision processing. In addition to the IT benefits associated with deploying Blaze Advisor within the .NET environment, we are ensuring that our customers are receiving the very best service and offerings on an individual basis."

Fair Isaac Blaze Advisor gives business users and analysts a powerful tool to update business strategies across critical enterprise information systems by using straightforward business terms. The control of the business logic embedded in IT systems allows business users to alter application behavior without IT assistance, using intuitive rules maintenance applications. This feature enables increased business agility, allowing rules to be modified quickly and easily, requiring IT to simply link and test the final applications. Blaze Advisor for .NET enables users to develop rule services that interoperate with Microsoft Visual C# .NET, Visual Basic .NET, Visual J# .NET, XML, .NET, COM, messaging, and databases, as well as Web services.

"The introduction of Blaze Advisor for .NET advances our leadership role in rules management technology and meets our clients' needs for enterprise agility and increased operational control," said Todd Davis, vice president of enterprise decision management at Fair Isaac. "Blaze Advisor for .NET provides enterprises with an open application development platform that provides IT leaders with unparalleled integration options, enhanced performance and greater resources."

Blaze Advisor is part of Fair Isaac's software and solutions for enterprise decision management (EDM), which combines data analytics, modeling and policy-level control to allow companies to define and manage their automated business systems for improved efficiency and greater profitability. Fair Isaac offers clients a combination of software and services, allowing an enterprise to quickly implement customized systems that lower operational costs, reduce risk and provide greater accuracy and consistency of critical business decisions in interactive and batch applications.