Speedware Joins Microsoft AS/400 Program

Published: May 26, 2009

by Alex Woodie

Speedware is the latest ISV to join the Midrange Alliance Program, Microsoft's program for consultants and ISVs who are interested in advocating a .NET approach to modernizing OS/400 programs, and migrating them off the platform to Windows.

Speedware is a Montreal, Quebec-based company that has been helping AS/400 shops modernize their applications for the last 10 years. In addition to modernizing their systems, Speedware has developed a collection of tools to help automate the process of migrating AS/400 shops and their RPG code off the proprietary midrange platform entirely. This makes Speedware a good fit for Microsoft's MAP program, which was created about five years ago along with its Mainframe Alliance Program.

The work Speedware has done helping AS/400 and HP e3000 shops overcome difficulties with maintainability, problems with integration, and end-of-life hardware and software support issues has prepared the company well for its association with Microsoft's MAP, says Christine McDowell, Speedware's manager of strategic migration alliances, in a press release.

"By joining MAP we show our customers that we are committed to helping them leverage the value of their mission-critical legacy applications while transitioning them to Windows platforms quickly and helping them reduce the IT risk to their business," she says.

Microsoft, in turn, is happy to welcome Speedware into the MAP fold. "With their extensive modernization experience, integration services and automated tools, Speedware provides added value to existing MAP members and customers interested in moving from legacy systems to the more agile and cost-effective Microsoft platform," says Scott Rosenbloom, director of Microsoft's Mainframe Alliance Program, in a press release. (Microsoft has apparently had some difficulty filling the MAP directorship, and has relied on the mainframe MAP director to fulfill its duties.)

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