EASEL, INTELLIGENT ENVIRONMENTS, NETLINKS AND SYMANTEC ANNOUNCE PLANS TO
INTEGRATE IBM'S SOM AND DSOM OBJECT TECHNOLOGY

AUSTIN, March 17, 1994...IBM Personal Software Products division (PSP)
announced today that four additional providers of application development
tools are licensing IBM's System Object Model (SOM) and workstation
Distributed SOM (DSOM) technologies. Easel Corp., Intelligent
Environments, Inc., NetLinks Technology, Inc. and Symantec Corp. have all
said that upcoming revisions of their products will integrate SOM and
DSOM.

These announcements continue to expand the world of programming tools that
support SOM and DSOM. Symantec is announcing that its current version of
C++ supports the development of SOM/DSOM applications. In addition,
Symantec will include SOM and DSOM in upcoming versions of Symantec C++
Professional. Intelligent Environments has said it will integrate SOM and
DSOM into upcoming versions of its AM (Application Manager) family of
powerful 4GL visual client/server development tools for OS/2. NetLinks has
said it is licensing IBM's SOM and DSOM technologies for integration into
its ORBitize distributed object development tool for OS/2, AIX and
Microsoft Windows, the first in its family of ORB-based development tools.
Easel will provide support for SOM and DSOM in ENFIN and Synchrony, its
Smalltalk-based visual programming tools for OS/2, Windows and Unix.

With these announcements, more than 18 tool providers, including many
industry leaders, have announced their support for IBM's SOM and DSOM,
with over 14 tools scheduled to be available this year. In addition,
VisualAge, IBM's visual builder and Smalltalk development environment,
will deliver SOM support in the second quarter of 1994 and C Set++ for
OS/2, IBM's integrated development environment, will beta SOM with
customers in the second half of 1994.

The SOMobjects Developer Toolkit, which integrates the SOM and DSOM
technologies, provides developers with the technology needed to break the
language barriers that have severely limited the commercial use of
object-oriented programming to date. With SOMobjects, object classes
created using a wide range of popular object-oriented programming tools
can interoperate and use a common set of class libraries. Code can be
easily reused, realizing a primary benefit of object-oriented
programming.

Simultaneous with this announcement, IBM announced a Windows version of the
SOMobjects Developer Toolkit, offering developers support for both
Microsoft Corp.'s Component Object Model (COM) and the OpenDoc compound
document architecture (See separate release).

Easel Corp.

Easel has licensed IBM's SOM and DSOM as a means to enable object
interoperability for applications built with its client/server application
development tools. Easel will initially provide support for SOM and DSOM
in ENFIN and Synchrony, its Smalltalk-based visual programming tools for
OS/2, Windows and Unix. ENFIN and Synchrony, members of the Object Studio
product family, allow developers of client/server applications to create
"business objects," software components that embody an organization's
business processes and data.

"Our licensing of IBM's SOM and DSOM technologies provides a framework for
customers to interoperate with heterogeneous objects, no matter what their
implementation language," said John Dove, senior vice president of Easel's
Object Studio product line. "SOM and DSOM provide the necessary
infrastructure for building distributed object computing applications. Our
tools provide the keys to leverage object technology and deliver
applications that are truly responsive to today's dynamic business
requirements."

Intelligent Environments, Inc.

Intelligent Environments has said it will integrate SOM and DSOM into
upcoming versions of its AM (Application Manager) family of powerful 4GL
visual client/server development tools for OS/2. This integration will be
delivered through AM SOM/Workbench software scheduled for availability in
the fourth quarter of 1994. AM SOM/Workbench will combine a SOM class
browser with AM code generation facilities, offering developers a rapid,
automatic method for understanding class features and programming
elements, and putting objects to use in client/server applications.

"Intelligent Environments wants to make the benefits of object-oriented
programming techniques more easily attainable in IS organizations," said
Terry Golesworthy, president of Intelligent Environments. "Integrating AM
with SOM and DSOM will let IBM's and our customers build, share, and reuse
standard and custom objects -- regardless of language -- as they develop
client/server business applications."

NetLinks Technology, Inc.

NetLinks has said it is licensing IBM's SOM and DSOM technologies for
integration into ORBitize distributed object development tool for OS/2,
AIX and Windows, the first in its family of ORB-based development tools.
ORBitize allows developers to visually develop, maintain and exploit
distributed CORBA objects, including SOM. NetLinks is also developing a
version of its ORBworkshop that introduces distributed objects to
developers via a combination of lectures and DSOM-based labs.

"NetLinks is making it easier for developers and integrators to
successfully apply ORB technology," said Mark Roy, co-founder of NetLinks.
"Integration of SOM and DSOM into ORBitize takes it one step further by
simplifying the edit-load-generate cycle of ORB-based development."

Symantec Corp.

Symantec has announced that their Symantec C++ supports the development of
SOM/DSOM applications for the Windows platform. In addition, they have
announced their intent to license SOM and DSOM and deliver the
technologies in an upcoming version of Symantec's C++ Professional.

"We are pleased to be enter this partnership with IBM," said Gene Wang,
Symantec's executive vice president of applications and development tools.
"IBM's SOM technology represents an important conceptual evolution in
object-oriented programming, and we plan to include the Windows version of
SOM and DSOM with our world-class compiler, Symantec C++ Professional."

Headquartered in Austin, Texas, IBM Personal Software Products division is
an industry leader in the development of operating systems and networking
products for personal computers. In 1992, IBM introduced OS/2 Version 2,
the market-leading 32-bit multitasking operating system for the PC. Today,
PSP develops, manufactures, markets and supports a wealth of software,
including operating systems, LAN systems, object technology, multimedia
and pen products.

International Business Machines Corporation
IBM United States
1133 Westchester Avenue
White Plains, New York 10604

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