SCO unveils Internet products

The Santa Cruz Operation Inc., the leading provider of Unix operating systems in the federal government, today unveiled a new strategy to deliver a family of Unix-based Internet products.

"We're bringing out a family of Internet products that will provide government users [with] a solution that is based on Unix, which is an environment which the government has been installing and has been comfortable with," said Jeffrey Ait, vice president for Internet at SCO. "We're enhancing our server base to make it Internet-ready."

"All of the technologies [SCO will offer] might be available from separate vendors in the market today," Greg Schwartzer, manager of business development for SCO's Layered Products Division. "However, they're not available in one simple-to-install, easy-to-configure solution."

SCO plans to offer capabilities for accessing the Internet, publishing on the World Wide Web, creating virtual, private networks using authentication and encryption, and enabling electronic commerce.

The products and services will hopefully add to such existing SCO contracts as the Army's PC-1, according to SCO officials. "We will make the products available through our government reseller and systems integrators," Ait said.

SCO says it plans to provide value-added channel partners with the new SCO Internet products and ally with other Internet product developers to produce Internet products and services. The company has already announced agreements with Netscape Communications Corp., under which SCO will offer Netscape's line of products for the SCO OpenServer and SCO UnixWare platforms. Under the agreement, SCO will resell Netscape products.

In addition, SCO has announced agreements with Morning Star to deliver security features and with Micro Computer Systems to offer Internet connectivity solutions for Novell Inc. NetWare IPX/SPX clients.

SCO's Internet strategy is meant to appeal to agencies that have differing levels of Internet connectivity. "This is a product that allows you to adapt to the level of Internet readiness that you have already and the level of hardware and software you have installed," said Michael Buchko, general manager of SCO's government systems group.

Providing the capability to set up "Intranet" technology, SCO plans to incorporate LAN-to-LAN connectivity, Netscape products and NetWare Services for SCO Unix-based operating systems.

As part of its strategy, SCO will also offer a server configuration that features a graphical Hypertext Markup Language-based configuration tool for installation, configuration and administration of the entire SCO Internet family.

The first product in the SCO Internet family, expected before the end of May, will be an integrated, bundled Internet solution, with additional products to follow.

Pricing has not yet been released. SCO plans to show beta versions of the software at FOSE '96.