IBM Announces New Net.Commerce for AS/400 with Payment Server
IBM announced today Version 3 of its Net.Commerce for AS/400 e-business building solution. The addition of the IBM Payment Server for AS/400 is expected to enhance the AS/400 market's capacity for creating online shopping sites using Net.Commerce.
With Version 3, IBM offers its payment server either as an integrated component of Net.Commerce or as a standalone module that can be used with other e-business building tools.
IBM is counting on new features like the store creation wizard, payment server, Lotus Domino integration, advanced catalog tools and back-end integration tools to prompt the AS/400 market to give Net.Commerce careful consideration.
A large portion of the AS/400 market has not yet been exposed to Net.Commerce, even though Version 2.0 has been available since late summer of 1998, according to Suzi Shaw Lyons, IBM's AS/400 e-business marketing manager. "Certainly the number [of users who] have taken advantage of it is in the hundreds, not the thousands, which, when you look at the size of our installed base, is fairly small," she says.
Net.Commerce provides the AS/400 market with a tool for creating a total e-commerce solution -- from catalog and site creation on through to managing the store and tracking orders, payment processing and order fulfillment, according to Lyons. "Net.Commerce [for AS/400] Version 2 wasn't that easy to install and setup. So, when you look at things like the store creation wizard, which has a set of pre-defined templates, it's going to make it that much easier for AS/400 customers to get started in e-commerce with Net.Commerce," she says.
Net.Commerce Version 3 has been available since April 30. The Payment Server component becomes available on June 11.
--L. Greenemeier