Air Products optimises SAP solutions with Mercury Interactive`s Optane

Issued by Mercury Interactive
Johannesburg, 24 Jul 2003

Today, Mercury Interactive Corporation announced that Air Products has successfully used Mercury Interactive Optane for SAP solutions to facilitate the roll-out of the mySAP Business Suite. Using Optane for SAP solutions, Air Products tested and validated the system performance and scalability required to meet the business needs of more than 5 500 employees in serving Air Products` customers.

Mercury Interactive`s Optane for SAP solutions is a family of application delivery and management software products that improve application performance and quality, while lowering the costs and time frame required to deploy, manage and support SAP solutions.

"When it comes to successful application delivery, there`s no alternative to an automated, managed quality program," says Duane Fisher, quality assurance manager, SAP Support and Competency at Air Products. "Mercury Interactive`s Optane for SAP solutions helps ensure that the quality assurance philosophy we apply to the development of our products extends through to our IT service delivery. Using Optane provides us with a repeatable methodology that dramatically improves the quality of our application-enabled business processes without the incremental cost of adding hardware."

Air Products employed Mercury Interactive Optane to validate application functionality and scalability, software configuration, and capacity assessment prior to deployment of the first phases of their mySAP Business Suite roll-out. Using Optane, Air Products was able to find and correct performance issues before they could impact the business. The company currently has about 15% of its operations on the system, and plans to complete the roll-out in several more phases.

"More than 90% of the performance problems we see can be corrected by ensuring that our software configuration settings are optimised for our infrastructure," says Fisher. "With Optane, we can make sure we`re getting the full value of every server, every memory chip, and every application that`s deployed."

"Mercury Interactive helped Air Products meet huge organisational challenges that large-scale quality testing presents," said Dave Sheffield, director, SAP Knowledge Centre at Air Products. "Optane provides a structured testing environment that can help manage the business risk of a major deployment. You know where you are, what you`ve done and what you haven`t done in every stage of the process."

Optane

The Optane product family is Mercury Interactive`s family of application delivery and management software. Optane provides technology professionals with a comprehensive approach for measuring, maximising and managing performance and quality across all stages of the application lifecycle. Comprised of three product lines that share common assets, metrics and reusable scripts, the Optane family enables the application of business technology optimisation principles to reduce costs and increase application effectiveness.

Air Products

Air Products (NYSE:APD) serves customers in technology, energy, healthcare and industrial markets worldwide with a unique portfolio of products, services and solutions, providing atmospheric gases, process and specialty gases, performance materials and chemical intermediates. The company is the largest global supplier of electronic materials, hydrogen, helium and select performance chemicals. Founded in 1940, Air Products is recognised for its innovative culture, operational excellence and commitment to safety and the environment. With annual revenues of $5.4 billion and operations in over 30 countries, the company`s 17 200 employees build lasting relationships with their customers and communities based on understanding, integrity and passion. For more information, visit www.airproducts.com.

Mercury Interactive Corporation

Mercury Interactive, the global leader in business technology optimisation (BTO), delivers Optane, a family of products for application delivery and management, that enables customers to optimise business processes and maximize business results. Customers worldwide use Mercury Interactive`s Optane to improve quality and performance, reduce costs, and align IT with business goals.

Founded in 1989, Mercury Interactive is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, with offices in more than 25 countries. Further information is available at www.mercuryinteractive.com or by phone at US +1 408 822 5200. The company`s common stock trades on the Nasdaq National Market under the symbol MERQ.

Editorial contacts