Application Middleware

Five brands made it to the Users' Choice club in this segment. IBM Websphere

took the top spot, followed by Oracle 9i/10g at second place and Microsoft IIS

taking the third spot. The remaining two were Novell and SGI, and were well

behind the first three.

Looking at industry segments, IBM WebSphere was strong across all except

discrete manufacturing, communication media, and education segments. Oracle

9i/10g on the other hand emerged the strongest in education and discrete

manufacturing segments. Microsoft IIS had the second highest presence in

discrete manufacturing.

Oracle 9i/10g enjoyed the highest brand loyalty amongst its existing owners,

with 59% of of them saying that they're likely to stay with it in the near

future. On the flip side, none of the other brand owners showed any interest in

moving to Oracle 9i/10g.

Novell had the second highest brand loyalty at 50%. Fortunately for

Microsoft, a majority of its existing owners were not sure or had no plans to

shift to another brand. That's a window of opportunity to tap.