The WS-I yesterday announced Sun and webMethods, who represent opposite sides of the spectrum in terms of their size, beat Cape Clear Software Inc, Nokia Corp and SeeBeyond Technology Corp to win two specially created board seats.
VeriSign Inc, also a candidate at one point, missed out on eligibility because it failed to attend enough meetings the WS-I said.
Sun, with the most votes, holds its seat for two years and webMethods, which came second, takes its seat for a year. WS-I has not released details of voter break down but said a large percentage of its 160 plus membership turned out. New members take their seats on April 1.
The elections complate a year’s worth of lobbying by Sun to join the board, after it was excluded from the founding membership in February 2002. Sun’s exclusion appeared to be a ploy supported by WS-I co-founder Microsoft Corp according to e-mail evidence produced in the remedy phase of that company’s anti-trust case with the US government.
Sun’s WS-I representative Mark Hapner is chief web services strategist for its Java web services group. He told ComputerWire the presence of his company would ensure the WS-I grows in credibility, because of its industry experience. He added Sun should have been a board member from the start.
It means the WS-I has that much more credibility by allowing Sun to participate at board level. We have a strong perspective on the Java community and the standards community, Hapner said.
webMethods’ WS-I representative Andy Astor will press the twin causes of integration and greater involvement in WS-I activities from members who are smaller than the nine co-founders and Sun.
Astor, webMethods’ vice president for enterprise web services, said web services are about integration but that vendors like IBM Corp and BEA Systems Inc, also on the board and aggressively promoting integration, lacked the expertise of a company with six years’ experience in integration like his.
He added it is important webMethods, BEA and IBM, who compete, also sat on the board together. Interoperability of standards around integration, that’s the end mission, Astor said.
Representation of small WS-I members is a concern, too. The vast majority of the WS-I community are webMethods-sized companies or smaller. A lot of companies I spoke to during the campaign are anxious to see a company that represents the interests of small vendors, who don’t have $30m in the bank.
Astor said he wants to make the WS-I board process more transparent with greater involvement from members, while also recruiting a greater number of non-vendor members.
Source: Computerwire
