Essentially, the Sybase Data Integration Suite bundles four existing products: Sybase Replication Server (now just called Sybase Replication), Sybase Avaki (now called Sybase Data Federation), Sybase Search and Sybase Real-Time Events. The company will add Sybase ETL to the suite at a later date, by the middle of next year.

Of the five products, only Sybase Replication can now be purchased separately, said Sybase director of product management for IT solutions Sumit Kundu.

But buying it as part of the suit will give you certain advantages, he said.

This is really about the metadata management and development environment, which is actually combined together, as well as integrated administration, Kundu said. What we are providing as a suite is really a capacity to share metadata across these five components.

In other words, if the all the metadata is managed in a single place with intelligence, then the effects of changes to the metadata can be more easily managed.

Sybase Replication enables users to move data from operational data sources to other secondary targets, while Data federation provides a common view of multiple data sources. Real-Time Events captures events of interest as they happen in operational data sources and sends them through message buffers.

Sybase Search includes context searches on structured data, and Sybase ETL extracts data from databases loads them into data warehousing-type products.

The components do not have to be bought all at once, Kundu said. You could start off with just one component and add components as [the company’s] needs grow, he said.

Database vendors, including IBM, Microsoft and Oracle, and business intelligent software makers, such as Business Object and SAS, would rival Sybase’s bundle, but those companies offer point solutions and not an entire suite, Kundu said.

Pure-play data integration vendors, such as Informatica, would also compete, but Kundu also pointed to Sybase’s complete stack.

Kundu also pointed out that the suite was heterogeneous, and, there, not specific to Sybase in any way.

Pricing of the Sybase suite has yet to be finalized, but the product, which is slated for release in October, is squarely aimed at large enterprises, Kundu said.

However, Sybase also will release a scaled-down, cheaper version for the middle market, he said.