San Francisco, CA., June 15, 1999 - 3Com Corporation (Nasdaq:COMS) and Sun Microsystems (Nasdaq:SUNW) today announced their commitment to tightly integrate Sun's Java™ technology with the industry-leading Palm Computing® platform. At the Java Developers Conference in San Francisco's Moscone Center, Sun and 3Com outlined plans to develop a reference port of the Java™ 2 Platform, Micro Edition, Sun's highly optimized Java runtime environment for consumer products, for 3Com's Palm™ operating system (Palm OS™) software later this year. The companies also agreed to make Sun's K Virtual Machine (KVM), formerly known as project KJava VM, a key component of the Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition, available on the Palm OS software. The companies will develop an end-to-end solution for delivering content and Java applications to Palm Computing platform devices via Sun's software products. The companies are also exploring opportunities to integrate Sun software with 3Com's Palm.net service, the recently announced wireless Internet access and messaging service for the 3Com® Palm VII™ connected organizer.
The Palm OS software will serve as a primary reference platform for application development using KVM. KVM brings the power, flexibility and innovation of Java technology-based applications and services to high-volume, small-footprint consumer and business products such as handheld computing devices, mobile phones and pagers. With KVM for the Palm Computing platform, software developers will be able to quickly and easily extend Java technology-based applications and information to Palm Computing platform devices. Examples of solutions that could result from such development include wireless and wired access to corporate e-mail; applications that connect Palm Computing® devices to the Internet for Java technology-based e-commerce and electronic banking, and intranet data access solutions for highly mobile applications such as those used in sales force automation, health care and transportation, to name a few. Many analysts predict that the Java platform will become the dominant environment for mission-critical business applications development.
"The Palm Computing platform is the standard for giving users seamless access to personal and mission-critical business information, wherever it resides," said Robin Abrams, president for Palm Computing, Inc., a 3Com company. "By integrating the Palm Computing platform with Sun's Java technology, Palm Computing products can become even more tightly integrated with intranets and the Internet. Our combined technologies will give companies an open, standards-based environment for rapidly distributing information to everyone in the organization, for faster and smarter decision-making."
"We are committed to working with leading device manufacturers such as 3Com to deliver Java technology-based consumer solutions worldwide," said Mike Clary, vice president and general manager, Consumer and Embedded, Sun Microsystems, Inc. "Devices supporting the Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition, such as the Palm family of connected organizers, will allow developers to rapidly and cost-effectively develop, deploy and enhance e-commerce, entertainment, information and advanced telephony services. With the Java 2 Platform, Micro Edition, wireless carriers and service providers will be able to leverage their existing infrastructures to provide a rich variety of value-added content and services to their customer base."
Sun will provide a developer's release of the KVM to attendees of the JavaOne '99 conference this week. Code will be distributed on Palm V™ handheld devices made available at a special price to JavaOne Conference attendees. "Another inherent benefit of this agreement is the great expansion of our respective development communities," added Abrams. "We already have over 17,000 developers creating solutions for the Palm Computing platform. The ability to run Java applications on our products opens up development to tens of thousands of Java developers creating both consumer and business solutions that can now be extended to our platform."
These joint initiatives build on the 3Com and Sun alliance to combine the strengths of their respective technologies to enable a greater link between technical, enterprise and mobile computing. In February of this year, the companies announced that Sun licensed Palm Computing's HotSync® data synchronization technology. Sun is porting the HotSync technology to the Java platform to create Java™ technology-based conduits that will provide data synchronization between Palm Computing® platform handheld devices and applications running on Sun™ platform-based workstations. Today's announcement demonstrates their continued commitment to bringing to market a new class of solutions built on industry-leading technology to simplify the lives of consumers and business professionals alike.
The Palm Computing platform is the foundation for the world's leading family of handheld computing products from 3Com including the Palm III™, Palm IIIx™, Palm V, and the new Palm VII™ connected organizers, in addition to a broad range of products from Palm Computing's strategic partners. These products include the IBM WorkPad PC companion, the Franklin-Covey Electronic DayPlanner, the Symbol STP™ 1500 with built-in barcode scanning capabilities for vertical markets, and the upcoming pdQ Smartphone from QUALCOMM. Palm Computing platform products already hold a 72 percent share of the worldwide handheld personal companion market (IDC, November, 1998).
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