BEA Systems, Inc one of the world`s leading e-business infrastructure software companies, today announced that virginmoney.com, a UK finance portal, has selected the award-winning BEA WebLogic Server, the world`s number one Java application server, to expand its online financial services.
BEA WebLogic offers virginmoney.com a scalable, robust platform to develop its new e-business offerings. Launched on 15 July 2001, the site features "wizards" designed to search the financial products of 23 "e-ssociate" partner companies.
"Due to our plans for expansion later this year, we did not have the luxury of being able to spend between three to six months evaluating all the products available," said Mark Hodgkinson, chief technical officer at virginmoney.com. "As the market leader, BEA was the obvious, reliable choice."
Virginmoney.com`s expansion plans for its financial product portfolio over the next year forced it to reassess the feasibility of its existing infrastructure. "We required an open standards-based architecture upon which to base our growth plans," Hodgkinson said. "We chose BEA`s WebLogic Server because it provides us with a solid foundation, as well as the opportunity to add more applications in the future to maintain our competitive advantage in the online financial market. J2EE simplifies application development and decreases the need for programming. This makes our site simpler to maintain, exceptionally scalable and, therefore, richer for our customers."
"Virginmoney.com leads the Virgin Group in terms of advanced systems and entrepreneurial spirit," said Alan Banks, managing director of BEA Systems, Inc in the UK. "They have ambitious expansion plans, so consequently virginmoney.com sought a platform that could scale to support their development strategy."
Virginmoney.com chose BEA WebLogic E-Business Platform(TM) and Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) for their ability to design, develop, assemble and deploy enterprise applications quickly and efficiently.
Virginmoney.com officials also cited the support from the BEA Professional Services team, which is helping the company re-engineer its Web site to J2EE by providing performance testing and architecting services.
"Our customers are confident financial consumers, looking for impartial help in finding the right product," said Hodgkinson. "We offer the `best of the best` of online financial products, including individual saving accounts (ISAs), unit trusts, mortgages, personal loans, stakeholder pensions, and home and car insurance. By adding to and enhancing virginmoney.com`s online services, we hope to build the business and win new customers."
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Virginmoney.com was launched in June 2000 with the ultimate aim of becoming a one-stop financial shop where users can search the whole marketplace and get impartial help in finding the right product. The site offers the "best of the best" of online financial products including ISAs, unit trusts, mortgages, personal loans, stakeholder pensions, home and car insurance.
Virginmoney.com brings together a range of top product providers or "e-ssociates," which meet Virgin`s tough standards of service, performance, fair charges and delivery.
The site`s unique "wizards" and powersearches help users research and compare products across the entire market and then apply online from one of the e-ssociates. There is also an online sharedealing service, and customers can share their financial experiences with the virginmoney.com community on the discussion forums and get advice from their expert industry gurus on a variety of financial matters.
BEA
BEA Systems, Inc is one of the world`s leading e-business infrastructure software companies, with more than 10 000 customers around the world, including the majority of the Fortune Global 500. BEA and its WebLogic brand are among the most trusted names in e-business.
Businesses built on the award-winning BEA WebLogic E-Business Platform are reliable, highly scalable, and poised to bring new services to market quickly. BEA`s e-business platform is the de facto standard for more than 1 900 system integrators, independent software vendors (ISVs) and application service providers (ASPs) to provide complete solutions that fast-track and future-proof e-businesses for high growth and profitability.
Headquartered in San Jose, California, BEA has 92 offices in 32 countries and is on the Web at www.bea.com.
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