Alliance members to integrate specialized e-Business Applications with Topaz

Mercury Interactive , the world`s leading provider of Web performance management solutions, today announced six new partners for its Open Architecture Alliance Program, formerly the Open Test Architecture Alliance Program. The program has expanded to reflect the overwhelming interest from partners and customers in the integration of Web performance monitoring into the e-business infrastructure, as well as testing. The program now includes Topaz, the Web performance monitoring suite that features an open application programming interface (API) for partners to build integrations with their own offerings. As a result, customers will have end-to-end e-business performance data integrated into one view, and with the root cause analysis features in Topaz, they can quickly drill down to pinpoint bottlenecks to keep their Web sites running smoothly.

Today`s announcement was made during the Mercury Interactive Worldwide User Conference taking place at the Disney Yacht and Beach Club Resort, in Lake Buena Vista, Florida.

The six new alliance partners, including Ambeo, Auspice, Inc., HydraWEB Technologies, Netuitive, Reef, and Persistence Software, will deploy e-business tools that can be integrated through open APIs in Topaz, LoadRunner, the market leading Web load testing solution, WinRunner for functional testing, and TestDirector for test management. By integrating their specialized e-business solutions with Topaz, OAP partners can offer customers the latest e-business technology - including data warehousing, network reliability, traffic management, predictive performance management and caching - with a single view of end-to-end performance and related infrastructure data presented within Topaz.

"The Open Architecture Alliance Program is really an ecosystem that enables partners to integrate their e-business and enterprise tools with our Web performance management solutions for rapid deployment to customers," said Jim Hare, director of alliances for Mercury Interactive. "Our partners add tremendous value by building these integrations, while customers get the best in e-business applications and performance monitoring to run their businesses and satisfy their own customers."

Six new partners kick off expanded alliance program

The six new Open Architecture Alliance Program members deliver a variety of e-business infrastructure software solutions, and will be involved in joint marketing efforts and integrating their applications with Mercury Interactive products. New members include:

• Ambeo

  - Ambeo is a leading vendor of query monitoring tools and services that help companies manage their eBusiness performance. onwhy, Ambeo`s new e-service, delivers key performance metrics, on-line consulting to customers, and a real time monitoring and alerting tool that will complement Topaz`s monitoring features for customers.

  www.ambeo.com

• Auspice, Inc

  . - Auspice specializes in critical eBusiness and network reliability solutions using both proprietary and third party technologies. Working with Topaz, customers will be able to tie all of their Web performance and network reliability information into one view, and quickly drill down to the root cause of problems. www.auspiceinc.com

• HydraWEB Technologies

  - HydraWEB is an eBusiness infrastructure company, building Internet Traffic Management products that provide load balancing for enhanced Web reliability. Integration with Topaz will allow customers to quickly tie load balancing with overall Web performance in a single console. www.hydraweb.com

• Netuitive

  - Netuitive offers predictive eBusiness performance management solutions that help companies foresee problems in their eBusiness infrastructure before they happen. Netuitive enhances Topaz by providing performance analysis solutions that dynamically learn normal system performance and predict near term application blackouts and brownouts. www.netuitive.com

• Persistence Software

  - Persistence Software delivers caching technology and products to speed business transactions and dynamic Web content for increased scalability. Working with Topaz, customers will have an overall view of Web performance and easily see the root cause of any problems.

  www.persistence.com

• Reef

  - Reef is a leading global Internet software company that provides Internetware, an open, integrated, software-based foundation for managing dynamic e-businesses. Companies of all sizes use Reef Internetware to embrace continuous change and maximize e-business efficiencies.

  www.reef.com

Expanding the web performance management "ecosystem" with topaz

Topaz is a suite of Web performance monitoring solutions that provides an early warning of performance degradation by correlating performance data back to the root cause both inside and outside the firewall. Topaz can shorten the time required to restore a Web site to its peak performance by helping customers minimize the business impact of potential performance problems and maintain the best possible user experience.

Mercury Interactive recently introduced a new non-intrusive, centrally located, network monitoring solution, Topaz Prism^O, that captures and analyzes every single request made to a Web server from all users, from all locations, all the time. Topaz also includes custom monitors that collect web and application server information for Alaire, Ariba, BEA, Blue Martini, Broadvision, IBM WebSphere and others.

By integrating performance data from their products with Topaz, OAP partners can give customers one view of their infrastructure through the Topaz console, and then drill down to the root cause of any problem and address it before affecting the customer experience and revenue stream.