Attenda breaks out of Windows

Infrastructure management and services company Attenda has extended its software to support Sun Solaris, hoping to make its offerings attractive to companies with multiple operating systems.

The move is a response to customer demand and a recognition that a mix of operating systems will be the norm in the future. It will also help the company penetrate new markets such as non-Microsoft third-party data centres.

Attenda previously focused only on Microsoft operating systems.

Chief executive Mark Fowle told vnunet.com: "Several clients said that [Attenda] had done a great job on Microsoft. But they had an interest in other platforms.

"We chose Solaris primarily because, in an internet-centric world, Solaris has the highest saturation after Microsoft."

Attenda is aiming to cover a much wider range of front- and back-end systems. Fowle explained that the company is looking at the most popular operating systems and applications.

Its software now supports Oracle databases, and work is underway to support the BEA WebLogic J2EE application server, he said.

Brian Horseford, IS director at human resources solutions firm Adecco, which outsources its .Net support to Attenda, said: "It is long overdue and a great strategy for Attenda.

"Mid-sized companies like ours want a one-stop shop for this type of software but want it to host on a number of platforms."

Adecco is a Hewlett Packard HP-UX user so cannot make immediate use of the extended availability.

The company now has Sun's SunTone and HP Signature Partnership certification, in addition to holding Microsoft certified gold partner Application Infrastructure Provision and BS7799 information security certificates.

It has also added two new practice areas to its outsourced service: operational consultancy and security management.

These build on the Attenda M.O. service through which it provides people, processes and technology for managing availability across mixed networked systems.