FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
STARBASE ANNOUNCES NON-EXCLUSIVE BUNDLING
AGREEMENT WITH ORACLE
Inclusion of StarBase’s Version Control Product Expands Market
Opportunity
Irvine, California, March 27, 1997 – StarBase Corporation (Nasdaq: SBAS)
today announced the completion of a non-exclusive bundling agreement with
Oracle to ship StarBase’s version control product, Versions 2.0, with
Oracle’s Developer/2000 product at no additional charge to the customer.
Oracle [Nasdaq: ORCL] is a major vendor of developer tools with the company
exceeding $5.2 billion in annual revenue.
Commenting on the importance of this bundling agreement, Donald R. Farrow,
President and COO of StarBase, said, “Oracle is the world’s second largest
software company and the market leader in application development. Oracle’s
decision to allow the inclusion of Versions 2.0 is acknowledgement of our
product; and we expect this agreement will offer us many marketing
benefits, including presentation of information about StarBase and our
products on Oracle’s Solutions Showcase website, and participation in
Oracle publications and trade show events.”
New Marketing and Upsell Opportunities
StarBase’s management team believes that bundling Versions 2.0 with
Oracle’s development tools will provide StarBase with access to potential
new users, other valuable co-marketing activities with Oracle, as well as
upgrade opportunities to the Company’s virtual team development suite,
StarTeam 2.0, which also interfaces with Oracle’s development tools. The
Company is offering all recipients of Oracle’s Developer/2000 tools a $100
certificate inside the product box, which can be applied towards an upgrade
to StarTeam 2.0.
StarBase Versions 2.0 Brings Oracle Developer /2000 Customers More
Choices
The source code management features contained in Versions 2.0 enable
programmers to improve development quality and productivity, enabling
project completion on time and within budget. Rene Bonvanie, Oracle’s
Senior Director of Product Marketing, said, “By integrating Versions 2.0
with the Developer/2000 tool, our customers will receive enhanced value and
functionality. This agreement brings Oracle customers more choices, and
StarBase gains exposure and upsell possibilities with more than 500,000
Oracle software developers.”
Oracle and StarBase Alliance
The alliance between the two companies, initially established in November,
is enhanced through this non-exclusive bundling agreement. A fully
functional copy of Versions 2.0 will be included with certain future
shipments of Developer/2000 starting with version 1.4W, scheduled to ship
in the Spring. The recipients of version 1.4W will receive, in conjunction
with Oracle’s Open Tools Initiative (OTI) program, a CD-ROM containing
Versions 2.0 and product demos of a range of other companies’ programming
tools. Versions 2.0 is the first fully functional software configuration
management product offered on the OTI disk. Versions 2.0 offers version
control, visual differencing, build and milestone management, audit logs,
security, and an advanced project repository for application and web site
developers.
Relevance to StarBase’s New Market Segmentation
Earlier this month, the Company announced a three-tiered market
segmentation strategy which management believes will broaden market
acceptance of Versions 2.0 and the growing family of StarTeam products.
Today’s announcement is the first of several agreements which will be
announced in the near future as the Company implements its new strategy
targeting three distinct segments of the Software Configuration Management
(SCM) market and represents a major inroad into establishing a presence in
the entry-level market segment.
Versions 2.0 is an entry-level, first tier product that provides a direct
upgrade path to a fully scalable family of StarTeam products that will be
offered for all three market segments. Versions 2.0 offers basic SCM
capabilities that are necessary to build quality software. An upgrade from
Versions to second or third tier StarTeam products adds team collaboration,
workflow, virtual team facilities with Internet/intranet connectivity, and
more sophisticated SCM capabilities.
StarBase, with headquarters in Irvine, Calif., offers a complete family of
SCM products designed to fill the needs of application and web site
developers and teams. StarTeam has won several awards including PC Week
Analyst’s Choice (10/96), PC Week 1996 IT Excellence Award (4/96) and PC
Week LABS Top Product of 1995 (12/95). More information is available by
calling 888-STAR700 or by web site at: http://www.starbase.com.
When used in the preceding discussion, the words “believes, expects, or
intend to” and similar conditional expressions are intended to identify
forward-looking statements. Such statements are subject to certain risks
and uncertainties and actual results could differ materially from those
expressed in any of the forward-looking statements. Such risks and
uncertainties include, but are not limited to, conditions in the general
economy or the software industry, the timely development and market
acceptance of products and technologies, competitive factors, demand for
ITE software products, sell-through of products in the sales channels and
other risks described in StarBase Corporation’s SEC reports and filings.
StarBase, StarTeam and Versions are trademarks of StarBase Corporation.
Other trademarks are the property of their respective companies.