SRA to bring Kana e-biz solutions to feds

Kana Communications Inc. and SRA International Inc. last week announced

a partnership to offer federal customers an integrated, World Wide Web-based

solution for managing and securing e-mail interaction with customers.

"I haven't seen a single government agency yet that doesn't face the

problem of too many e-mails without any efficient way to deal with them,"

said Barry Landew, SRA's senior vice president and chief e-commerce officer.

"I think this is going to be a really big business for us."

The partnership enables SRA, a systems integrator based in Fairfax,

Va., to resell Kana products.

The two companies also will work together on integrating selected technologies,

including SRA's Assentor, an e-mail message screening and archiving solution

widely used in the financial services industry. Kana will help make Assentor

a more appealing solution for federal users by adding management features

to the highly secure system, said Ian Cavanaugh, vice president of business

development at Kana.

"The partnership allows SRA to use our universal e-mail engine, which

is an incoming e-mail response management system, with the Assentor's secure

messaging [features]. It layers on top," Cavanaugh said, adding that SRA

will help Kana break into the federal space. "They are going to be our entry

into the federal government. SRA knows how the federal government operates

and how to apply our technology there."

SRA's federal customers include the departments of Defense, Health and

Human Services and Treasury, the Small Business Administration and the White

House, Landew said.

Kana, Redwood City, Calif., signed SRA as a premier partner for one

year with renewable terms but plans to treat the agreement as a strategic

alliance with long-term growth in mind, Cavanaugh said.

SRA already has staffed and trained a Kana solutions team and is about

to begin implementation of its first solution in the federal space, Landew

said.