January 26, 2001, 6:27 PM — FURTHERING ITS XML strategy, e-business infrastructure provider Tibco Software, based in Palo Alto, Calif., this week agreed to buy Chapel Hill, N.C.-based Extensibility, an XML software company.
"The most valuable resource Tibco acquired is people," said Kimberly Knickle, a research director at AMR Research, in Boston. "They needed the expertise, not just in products but in the people."
Jon Derome, a senior analyst at The Yankee Group, in Boston, said that Extensibility will help bring an XML focus to Tibco.
"Prior to Extensibility, there was no central point of responsibility, no single group concentrating on XML," said Fred Meyer, Tibco's vice president of product management.
The product lines are also complimentary because Tibco doesn't have some of the products that Extensibility has, such as an XML server.
Tibco plans to incorporate Extensibility's technology, which is used to design XML schemas that enable e-businesses to create and exchange digital documents and validate electronic commerce transactions into its own products.
Meyer said that combining Extensiblity's technology with its own XML and schema management capabilities will enable customers to create new types of software applications for conducting business over the Internet. Tibco also will continue to market and enhance stand-alone versions of Extensibility's products.
Yankee Group's Derome also said that the companies' selling practices will help Tibco expand the breadth of its market because Tibco aims for the high-end and Extensibility markets itself via the Web and telemarketing.
"This takes the Tibco brand down to the mid-market, which is important because they were pushing into that market, but were unsuccessful," he said.
