Introducing Progress Pacific: Freedom for Cloud and Mobile Apps

SOURCE: Progress Software Corporation

BEDFORD, Mass.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Progress Software Corporation (NASDAQ: PRGS) today introduced Progress^® Pacific^™, a powerful, easy-to-use platform for building and managing “connected apps” on any cloud, mobile or social platform. Connected applications integrate with real-time data from multiple sources for faster business reaction, analysis and problem solving. Progress Pacific is a fundamental new approach that gives businesses and independent software vendors (ISVs) the freedom to choose the data sources, deployment environments and business logic tools that best fit their needs.

“This platform gives us the tools to quickly build and enhance applications and moves from the traditional design, develop, test, deliver model to a more agile development process where all stakeholders can be involved not just in the decision but in the execution, build and deployment of the application”

This new platform is the foundation of a major PaaS (platform-as-a-service) transformation Progress previously announced to address customer and partner demand in one of the fastest growing IT markets. Today, businesses of all sizes are experiencing unprecedented market pressures and are turning to rapidly developed software applications for competitive advantage. These are typically confined to a specific service platform and are insufficient without integrated access to data from disparate SaaS, relational database, Big Data, social, CRM and ERP systems. Progress Pacific will uniquely solve this problem and eliminate lock-in with the industry’s most comprehensive set of integrated capabilities, including:

• * Rapid Development Using A “Cool” Technology: Powerful, standards-based business applications can go from idea to reality faster with innovative point-and-click, drag-and-drop tools in a standard browser, saving time and money while also providing deployment freedom. To enable this, Progress has acquired Rollbase, Inc., a privately held independent software vendor based in Saratoga, CA, that was recently named “One of the Cool Vendors in PaaS” by Gartner, Inc.^*Over 10,000 users are using custom Rollbase™ applications in10 languages globally. See demo.
• * Connection To The Most Data Sources: A comprehensive set of SaaS, relational database, NoSQL, Big Data, social, CRM and ERP sources can be tapped into for automated, context-aware applications. Technology from Progress DataDirect^®, the world’s leading data connectivity provider, helps to unlock an application’s full value by allowing faster integration, analysis and decision making. See demo.
• * Unique Hybrid Deployment Options: Unlike other vendors where deployment options are restricted to either cloud or on-premise, Progress Pacific offers developers the opportunity to create cloud apps that can be deployed in multiple environments (cloud, on-premise, hybrid) as well as connect to existing applications. By working harmoniously with current applications, including those using OpenEdge^®, Corticon^® and other technologies, critical data is accessible, business logic is preserved and investments are protected.

Availability:

• * The Progress Pacific platform will be generally available later in Progress’ fiscal third quarter with the Rollbase product available immediately.

Customer, Partner and Analyst Quotes:

Krish Mani, senior vice president and CIO, JELD-WEN, said, “We are one of the world’s leading manufacturers of reliable windows and doors. Our Progress-based application environment allows us to keep our focus on providing the best products and service, not the underlying IT infrastructure. We believe that new platforms like Pacific can help us simplify development even further as we create innovative, data driven applications to grow our business.”

Tony Winter, chief technology officer at QAD, said, “Progress and QAD have partnered for more than 20 years to deliver the technology that supports our enterprise resource planning (ERP) capabilities, used by many of the world’s leading manufacturers. Progress Pacific provides the building blocks to enable our customers to achieve QAD’s vision of Effective Enterprises, where every business process is working at peak efficiency and perfectly aligned to the customer’s strategic goals. ”

Simon Fowler, managing director – commercial at Advanced Business Solutions (Advanced), said, “This platform gives us the tools to quickly build and enhance applications and moves from the traditional design, develop, test, deliver model to a more agile development process where all stakeholders can be involved not just in the decision but in the execution, build and deployment of the application”

Carl Lehmann, IT analyst at 451 Research, said, “Application development teams always struggle to keep up with business demands. Seeking efficiency in the cloud era they are now considering platforms that emphasize configuration over coding. PaaS offerings that integrate data connectivity, application configuration and business rules, like that of Progress Software’s Pacific offering, represent the next generation of appdev and hybrid cloud IT strategy.”

Executive Quotes:

Phil Pead, president and CEO, at Progress, said, “Progress started 30 years ago with a simple premise that software shouldn’t be the sole purview of the computer programmer. That premise is still true today. We’ve designed this new platform for application development with the user experience in mind. It is built for the real world and the businesses that compete in it and where speed and simplicity matter most. We’re making it possible for anyone to bring their ideas to reality.”

Matt Robinson, co-founder and CEO of Rollbase, said, “We started Rollbase with the goal of creating a rapid application development platform for building cloud business applications with a minimal amount of code. After six years growing Rollbase into an industry-recognized innovator we are thrilled to be acquired by Progress Software to be at the center of Pacific.”