CrossWorks Denies Rumors It Is Leaving OS/400 Rehosting Biz

by Timothy Prickett Morgan

Just as we were heading off for the Thanksgiving holiday, California Software put out a press release saying it would offer support and competitive upgrades to customers from rival CrossWorks, which California Software said was rumored to be exiting the legacy OS/400 application rehosting biz. This is a perfectly standard raid on a rival's base, except for one thing: CrossWorks has no intention of leaving the legacy rehosting business and is completely mystified by the rumors that California Software alludes to.

Rivalries in the OS/400 application rehosting business have always run deep, and the difficulties between the Unibol division of UniComp and California Software led the two parties into court after they could not agree on the terms of a merger. That's ancient history, and it has left California Software selling its BABYi/Series, BABY/400, and BABY/36 rehosting environments as well as the Unibol/400 and Unibol/36 rehosting environments.

George Adzick, president of CrossWorks, says that the company will continue to sell and support its Cross400 and Cross36 application rehosting environments, and has no idea where California Software's top brass--president Carol Conway and vice president of new business development Tom Hoyt--got the idea CrossWorks was dropping its rehosting buisness. Hoyt refused to comment on the issue, preferring that Conway explain the CrossWorks rumor. Conway was unavailable to comment as we went to press. California Software's aggressive moves require no explanation--if CrossWorks was leaving the business, of course California Software would chase CrossWorks' customer base.

CrossWorks' Cross400 product allows RPG III, RPG IV, RPG 400, and ILE RPG applications to be rehosted to Windows NT, Windows 2000, Linux, or Unix (AIX, Solaris, and HP-UX) platforms. CrossWorks is based in Hopkins, Minnesota, and has been selling its tools for years against Unibol and California Software, which were bigger and more established companies when CrossWorks jumped into the fray. Adzick exhibited a sense humor about California Software's claims about his business. "They say that any press is good press, and there's very little harm done in this," he said. "California Software says they want to serve our customers, but the irony is that all of our customers are defectors from them."

Adzick said CrossWorks was looking to expand into other areas beyond legacy application rehosting to boost its overall business, but was emphatic that the Cross400 and Cross36 tools can and do hold their own against the BABY and Unibol products, and despite the poor economy that is dampening sales of all IT hardware and software, CrossWorks was going to stay in the game. Just like the rest of us.

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