Microsoft Corp has a new partner to work with on Windows NT server-to-host integration, in the shape of ten year-old Proginet Corp of Garden City, New York. The two have announced a technology transfer and marketing agreement, and Microsoft will take a minority equity stake in Proginet. In turn, Proginet has taken ownership of Microsoft Corp’s TransAccess client-to-legacy server integration tool, a remote procedure call product Microsoft acquired when it bought Netwise Inc back in 1995 (CI No 2,787). TransAccess – regarded as a no-nonsense system, and not apparently a competitor to Microsoft’s proposed Cedar client to mainframe transactional software – will be used as one of the components in Proginet’s new HostOffice tool, which mirrors the functionality of Microsoft’s BackOffice on mainframe systems, and also includes the Fusion FTMS file transfer management system, SecurePass security administrator, and SMS Systems Management Server-compliant management tools. HostOffice will continue to evolve as BackOffice does, in the direction of the Merchant Server and Transaction Server. Proginet, which would not reveal the size of Microsoft’s investment, said it was now regarded by Redmond as another product unit, having worked with the company for three years, integrating SecurePass into Microsoft’s SNA Server 3.0, just released. But it denied speculation that Microsoft intended to acquire the company. Meanwhile, Proginet, which is listed on the Vancouver Stock Exchange and has plans for a secondary public offering in the US next year, made an acquisition of its own two weeks ago when the operating assets of Palantine, Illinois-based KnowledgeNet Inc were acquired for an undisclosed sum. KnowledgeNet’s Net/Wrk database replication and data transfer product line will enable Proginet to extend HostOffice to IBM AS/400 host systems.
