Oracle Acquires Assets of Context Media

Some employees of Context Media will be moving over to Oracle, which plans to incorporate Context Media's technology into its enterprise content management software.

Building on its content management and collaboration strategy, Oracle has acquired assets from content integration software developer Context Media Inc.

In addition to acquiring Context Medias enterprise content integration technology, some of Context Medias engineering team and other employees will also be moving over to Oracle Corp. Oracle would not say how many employees will be moved.

Context Medias content integration middleware uses XML and Web services standards to integrate disparate document management, content management and other applications so users can search, retrieve and update data in multiple repositories.

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Oracle will initially incorporate Context Medias technology into its enterprise content management software, Oracle Content Services 10G, which Oracle plans to release "imminently," according to Rich Buchheim, senior director of product management for content products and strategy for Oracle, in Redwood Shores, Calif.

In the long term, Oracle plans to use Media Contexts content integration technology for broader applications, for example, with its Application Server and Fusion middleware. But the long-term roadmap is still in the works, said Buchheim.

Oracle says it is poising Content Services 10G initially for businesses to use either alongside their higher-end ECM (enterprise content management) software or to migrate their content, metadata and users to Content Services.

"The situation we find in most of our prospective and existing customers in medium to large enterprises is that typically they have one or more traditional high-end content management solutions in place, usually used by a small number of users and applied to specific mission-critical documents, document management or specific vertical applications.

The rest of the users in the enterprise are normally left to manage content in an ad hoc fashion," said Buchheim.

Oracle hopes to address those users with Content Services 10G, said Buchheim.

Oracles purchase of Context Media comes on the heels of IBMs acquisition last year of content integration software maker Venetica Corp.

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