Just as object request brokers are in the news with Borland International Inc’s acquisition of Visigenic earlier this week (CI No 3,292), Sun Microsystems is reported to be thinking of giving up on its own object request broker development, Neo, in favor of using third party products. Infoworld quotes Sun’s Solaris marketing manager Reny Malan, as saying that basic-level object request brokers have become a commodity item. They will soon be absorbed into the operating system, he told the publication. Sun’s NEO only ran in conjunction with its Solaris operating system, so wasn’t seen widely on the open market. And last week Sun announced that it would be using the ORB it acquired along with Chorus Systemes SA in the embedded systems market (CI No 3,251). Sun also has a Java ORB, JOE, aimed at IIOP applications. It is expected to make further announcements at the InternetWorld trade show in New York next month.