Microsoft's announcement of the Windows Workflow Foundation, to be launched in late 2006, gave rise to some concern about the prospects for BPM workflow products. Far from being a threat, Windows Workflow Foundation presents Skelta with new opportunities to address the BPM and Workflow market.
Skelta is ready with its strategy to take advantage of this opportunity.
You can find answers to some of the questions that you may have on how Skelta will respond to Windows Workflow Foundation here:
How will Skelta be impacted by Microsoft Windows Workflow Foundation?
Skelta sees the Windows Workflow Foundation as an opportunity and is committed to enhance its offerings in the BPM and workflow space. Highlights of Skelta's strategy for Windows Workflow Foundation are as follows:
- All future development after Skelta's 2005 product releases would be based on the Windows Workflow Foundation platform.
- Skelta will launch its next major release (code named 'Aquila') that would be built on Windows Workflow Foundation in tandem with the release of Windows Workflow Foundation.
- Skelta will provide a complete migration path for customers using previous versions of Skelta Workflow.NET to Aquila.
- Skelta will continue to leverage on and make R & D investments to integrate with all Microsoft products to provide Enterprise Process Management. Skelta's integration plans include Microsoft Office 12, BizTalk 2006, SharePoint, SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio.Net 2005, Live Communication Server 2005 and other MBS offerings.
- Aquila will be available to two different target segments similar to the current Skelta offerings. Skelta will thus continue to have a Rapid Process Integration Framework for ISVs and solution developers as well as Enterprise BPM suite for Enterprise customers.
- Skelta will announce new licensing models for ISVs / solution developers of Aquila.
- Windows Workflow Foundation will allow Skelta to focus more on providing value-added BPM features rather then core platform needs. With Aquila, Skelta will aim to provide a complete end-to-end enterprise BPM solution that includes all BPM components and addresses all segments of business users.
Is it safe to start integrating with the current release of Skelta? Will I have to completely rewrite my application when Windows Workflow Foundation gets released?
- Skelta intends to provide a complete migration path and tools for migration to Aquila (2006 release based on Windows Workflow Foundation). Skelta has expended significant efforts on research into Windows Workflow Foundation and our findings are that our core architecture aligns with Windows Workflow Foundation and shares similarities. We anticipate that there will be minimal changes to our APIs and controls. Coupled with Skelta's migration tools, applications integrated with current Skelta versions would not require significant investments to recreate applications/products.
** Skelta will continue to make announcements on our Windows Workflow Foundation Strategy and the development progresses on Aquila and make the entire roadmap transparent to all its customers
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