IBM Corp, which has had the nascent Network Computer market more or less to itself in the last year or so, should face stiffer competition through 1998 when – and if – Sun Microsystems Inc and Oracle Corp’s Network Computer Inc subsidiary finally deliver their own full-function NC devices. IBM, whose Network Stations are built for it by Network Computing Devices Inc, says it looks forward to the market momentum other vendors should help create. IBM claims to have shipped tens of thousands of NCs to some 1,500 customers. It will add new functions to connect Network Stations to its AS/400 servers as well as faster processors this year, but says the next quantum leap in NC technology will be the delivery of a Java operating system that will displace the current hotchpotch of proprietary system software vendors currently offer on NCs. JavaOS, which IBM is helping Sun Microsystems Inc lick in to shape, doesn’t look like it will debut in products any time before late in the second half of the year. The arrival of JavaOS devices should finally enable customers to construct the type of heterogeneous, multi-vendor networks NC proponents have been banging on about since they invented the concept. Java NCs will operate within end-to-end Java solutions in which Java applets and services can be developed, stored and deployed from any server to any manufacturer’s JavaOS-based network computer. Other software will be required to enable NCs to be managed within mixed PC networks and that’s where Network Station Manager program comes in.
