Web 2.0 tailored for business users

New suite from Serena Software lets business users build enterprise mash-up applications

Application lifecycle management firm Serena Software will today launch a set of products and services dubbed the Serena Business Mashup Suite, which are designed to let business users build and deploy their own process-based enterprise mash-up applications without the intervention of the IT department.

“If you take Web 2.0, business process management [BPM] and service-oriented architectures [SOAs] and mash them up you get an opportunity for business developers to compose applications,” explained Serena’s Rene Bonvanie. “Serena Business Mashup Suite offers great tools and a way of tapping into existing resources, and IT can still have oversight.”

The Serena suite includes a free Mashup Composer tool and the option of having those mash-ups deployed via an internal server or by Serena’s On-Demand Services.
One possible mash-up that could be created with the Composer is an application to connect the approval process between a firm’s Salesforce.com and SAP implementations, Bonvanie said. “SAP and Salesforce.com are both SOA-enabled and by doing a mash-up you remove the need for complex middleware,” he added.

Also featured in the suite is a Partner Program, which includes a mash-ups marketplace similar to Salesforce’s AppExchange. The Serena Mashup Exchange will offer an online catalogue of pre-packaged mash-ups, to be created by Serena, third-party developers, and other Business Mashup Suite users, Bonvanie said.