Web services get SKUs

You’ve got to hand it to all those early Web services startups. They dreamed big, attempted the impossible, and then quietly faded into history.

It was a unique point in time when pitching VCs was the real game. Ultimately, they didn’t have to make their narrowly focused, loosely coupled applications actually work in the enterprise. And even better, they didn’t need to prove there was a long-term business model.

Fast forward to today and companies such as IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Sun, and Microsoft are interested in using the ideas spawned during these times for large-scale Web services environments. Business process integration, EAI projects, and distributed computing models remain key target areas.

What has changed now is the Big Companies have realized a significant opportunity lies in delivering Web services to the enterprise in real software products with real SKUs (stock keeping unit).

Web services was originally about enlightened developers leading their companies out of the dark proprietary forest. That’s still true, but the maturity of Web services standards is changing the game. IBM and HP execs have figured out that any CIO, CTO, or vice president of technology worth his or her salt is ultimately not interested in a fine-grained discussion about SOAP, XML, or WSCI. Tangible products are needed to attack legacy applications and systems.

In response, IBM is attempting to clearly define the technical and business cases for its otherwise amorphous collection of Web services spare parts known as WebSphere.

In addition, IBM’s director of Web services technology, Bob Sutor, reports that successive iterations of WebSphere are trying to address another proverbial elephant in IBM’s executive boardroom — the On Demand vision desperately needs a physical manifestation. WebSphere must carry both these loads and more.

Meanwhile, HP is desperately trying to prove it’s no slouch when it comes to delivering a meaningful Web services architecture that enterprises can use to build a flexible infrastructure.

HP’s venerable OpenView platform is currently undergoing a makeover to incorporate business process orchestration, provisioning, security, directory integration, and SLA management capabilities. HP is even working with Cisco to develop virtualization technology and Web services-aware networks.

HP’s CTO Shane Robison says his long-term vision for the enterprise is to see OpenView grow beyond it systems management roots to monitor and manage a rich set of business applications.

Of course, these are just two examples of companies building a new generation of Web services platforms that also address the evolution of other environments such as pervasive computing and grids. (Expect to hear about more developments in this arena when InfoWorld‘s CTO Forum 2003: Traction Through Technology kicks off March 31 in Boston.)

But before we openly embrace the Web services’ product model, a word of caution. In many cases, in-house developers have access to the same open standards and tools offered by the Big Cos. If we take as true the notion that a useful Web service is one that, when operating, is invisible to the end-user, which badge is on the box still doesn’t matter.