Xsol given new cash injection

By ADAM GIFFORD

The Government's New Economy Research Fund is pumping a further $840,000 into software development company XSol and the University of Auckland to research technology that will allow multiple databases to be pulled together into one virtual database.

The grant is spread over two years.

XSol director John Blackham said the research was kicked off two years ago with a $1.5 million grant from the initial funding round, about $1 million of which was taken up.

He said that despite significant progress, it was still some time off from being a product. But, "we should have the first working version, with a limited featured set, later this year". He said there was a big potential market for technology that would enable real-time, simultaneous access to multiple databases.

"There are huge advantages for a company that can integrate its database with those of its clients, suppliers, service and financial providers, all in real time."

John Grundy, Auckland University professor of software engineering, said the Real-time Dataset technology the partnership was developing was a new approach to integrating enterprise information systems.

XSol this week released its first product, a business mapping tool called XSol To Order, the first part of what it intends to be its XSol OnDemand business process management system.

Blackham said the Xsol OnDemand tool, which would probably cost about $100,000, was designed to co-ordinate complex cross-system business transactions and to resolve data inconsistencies. The aim was to give a more complete picture of a business than traditional enterprise resource planning systems, without replacing such systems.