Ilog, a diversified midsized software vendor if there ever was one, is adding yet more diversity by broadening its business rules management system (BRMS) offering from its Java/C++ roots to .NET and COBOL.

(To recap, Ilog is a $160 million vendor that has three distinct product lines: BRMS, supply chain optimization, and visualization, which are not only distinct but have differing go-to-market strategies.)

The point is not that Ilog is going multi-platform with its BRMS, as it has had ports of its core rules management system offering available for Microsoft platforms before this. It's that Ilog is diving into the deep end of the pool in building a new offering that is fully native to the .NET environment, that will become a first class citizen with Microsoft’s Office Business Applications strategy (OBA).

Ilog announced its new Microsoft strategy late last year. The new offering wasnlt just a port of the company's flagship, Java-based JRules product, but a whole separate offering that would integrate, not at run time, but at design time and governanc elevel at the rules repository. The new offering, with the understated name Ilog Rules for .NET 3.0, would become a first-class citizen of Microsoft's Windows Workflow Foundation , providing full native support for OBA. That means that Ilog's rules engine could be embedded fully within Word, Excel, and SharePoint.

In a wide-ranging candid discussion with reporters and analysts at Ilog’s Dialog 2008 conference, CEO Pierre Haren summed up the company’s strategy with the pronouncement that, with the new BizTalk 2008, Microsoft’s middle tier integration platform was now enterprise ready. For emphasis, he stated on the record that the previous version of BizTalk was ”crap.”

With BizTalk 2008, Microsoft itself is attempting a major platform migration of its own, gradually superseding its previous process workflow templates with the new Workflow Foundation that came in with the latest WinFX programming models, which are now part of the 3.5 version of the .NET framework. (We’re sorry if we confused you there, but given the amount of legacy DNA that Microsoft has accumulated in its platforms, Microsoft’s platform offerings are always going to resemble a Russian Doll.) By the way, if you want an authoritative explanation of how WF differs from the workflow framework of BizTalk 2006, check out 26NY's Kent Brown's write-up from MSDN.

It’s all part of Microsoft’s emerging BPM strategy, expressed as part of the Oslo initiative, to build a core workflow offering atop which it mounts an aggress Business Process Alliance. Last December, Ilog joined that alliance, and with native .NET 3.0 support, Microsoft upgraded the Ilog partnership to Global ISV Partner level, an elite grouping of a baker’s dozen vendors.

For Ilog, this all means a whole separate code base to maintain. At Dialog 2008, it also announced a COBOL version of its BRMS. The guiding notion is that you will develop rules in whatever is the primary runtime platform at the business unit level, then use Ilog’s master BRMS rules repository to ensure that the rules are consistent across runtimes.

That’s a challenging strategy for several reasons. First, it involves maintaining multiple code bases, but secondly, it demands an effective SOA architecture to make the integration seamless. In all fairness, Ilog is hardly alone in facing the challenge, as enterprise package vendors such as Oracle and Infor, who have each accumulated multiple, incompatible product lines through acquisition. SOA offers an architecture that allows multi-platform product vendors to keep their separate offerings intact, while web services standards enables them to knit the pieces together without having to write their own proprietary frameworks.

But notably, some vendors like Infor have embraced SOA with a small “s,” as their implementation is not fully standards-based, but instead is designed to simplify connectivity within their own portfolios inside a black box. For Infor, it’s been simplified to the point that customers don’t even deal with the details of generating SOAP messages or WSDL service definitions. But then again, from an IT standpoint, Infor’s customer base is far less sophisticated than Ilog’s, and are likely trying to connect something like an old BPCS ERP system with one of Infor’s supply chain or logistics apps that came from completely different lineages.

By contrast, Ilog’s base tends to be higher end customers, as Ilog has deliberately until now not cultivated a low-end market (we met one of Ilog’s more inventive customers that is trying to persuade the company to take the chance and bundle a JRules Lite for one particular underserved segment: the legacy base of ColdFusion developers). And, from our experience in leading a SOA panel at Dialog indicated, it’s evidently a client base that’s relatively well informed about SOA.

The other interesting aspect about the Microsoft announcement is the fact that Ilog is also heavily playing up its alliance with IBM. Underscoring that was the appearance of IBM SOA marketing head Sandy Carter – IBM is not about to haul out its big guns for just any $160 million vendor. But rules management clearly fills a gap in IBM’s SOA platform, which it promotes with the message that it supports many styles of integration. But over the years, IBM has gradually acquired its way to that integration portfolio, from Ascential for providing the data integration engine, to FileNet for content management, and CrossWorlds for application integration.

Ilog clearly has a desire to stay independent, but on the other hand, it would make a very logical edition to the WebSphere Integration portfolio. Evidence of its desire to stay independent can be found in its bet on the Microsoft platform – Ilog would clearly not be investing the degree of resources necessary to become anointed by Microsoft as a strategy BPA alliance member if it were tidying itself for acquisition.

But then again, Rational was initially a Microsoft strategic partner, and backing 1996, became one of the few third parties to OEM its products directly into Visual Studio. A few years later, history changed.

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