SYBASE ANNOUNCES SECOND-GENERATION REPLICATION SOFTWARE

Next-Generation Replication Server Software Will Go Beyond Data Movement to
Replication of Business Logic for True Distributed Computing

EMERYVILLE, CA, March 21, 1995 -- Sybase, Inc., The Enterprise
Client/Server Company, today unveiled plans for its second generation of
Replication Server software, to be rolled out in two releases. Replication
Server 10.5, now shipping, provides enhanced performance, new dynamic
transaction routing capabilities, and added security. Replication Server
11.0, currently scheduled for Q4 1995, will offer features that take
customers beyond simple data movement to the replication of business logic
for true distributed computing. In conjunction with these releases, Sybase
also discussed its plans for the Replication Driver for ODBC and
Replication Agent for Lotus Notes. Together these products extend Sybase's
lead in providing the database industry's most comprehensive
infrastructure for heterogeneous, distributed client/server computing.

Replication Server software, already in use by more than 650 customers,
addresses a growing need among companies to maintain multiple copies of
data at different sites while ensuring the integrity and consistency of
this information at every location. It ensures the effective
implementation of data replication by offering capabilities to address a
broad range of customer application needs - from a simple model for warm
standby to sophisticated master-slave and peer-to-peer applications.
Sybase's new Replication Server products build on this strong foundation,
providing enhancements in support for heterogeneous environments,
flexibility to support diverse customer requirements, and ease of use.

"With more than 650 customers using Replication Server, we have seen the
broad span of applications made possible by this distributed computing
infrastructure - with many customers designing new, innovative uses as
they see the success of their initial installations," said Katrina
Garnett, vice president of Sybase's Distributed Objects and Connectivity
Group. "Our new Replication Server releases extend the product's
capabilities to provide even greater support for the advanced distributed
application schemes customers are developing, many of which have been made
viable for the first time through Replication Server."

Replication Server- Foundation for Distributed Computing

Replication Server software is built on a flexible, scalable architecture
to provide consistent, timely event-driven replication. Key components of
this product include the core Replication Server, the Replication Agent,
and the Replication Manager.

With Replication Server, each piece of data typically has a primary owner,
which is the original source of the data. Remote sites then subscribe to
the data for which they require updates. This subscription feature allows
customers to identify, down to the record or column level, only that
information which a given database needs or is allowed to access, reducing
network and system overhead and facilitating security. For customers
requiring a peer-to-peer model, Replication Server allows distributed
databases to act as both owners and subscribers of a common data set.

The process of replication starts with the Replication Agent, a component
of Replication Server that monitors the database log for committed
transactions or "events" that are of interest to the subscribing sites.
The Replication Agent then passes information about the transaction to the
Replication Server, which distributes it to subscribing sites. This
process contributes to reductions in network and system overhead, since
only the transaction- and not all the data - is being replicated.

To facilitate administration of the system, the Replication Server Manager
- a powerful, graphical user interface-based tool - provides
configuration, performance monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities.

Replication Server provides the industry's most extensive support for
replication in heterogeneous distributed environments, with the ability to
replicate data from SYBASE SQL Server databases to more than 22 relational
and non-relational data sources via Sybase's Enterprise CONNECT family of
interoperability software. A SYBASE Replication Agent for DB2 option that
enables replication from DB2 databases is scheduled to ship in March
1995.

Replication Server 10.5 Features

Replication Server 10.5 extends the software's flexibility, security, and
performance capabilities through three key enhancements:

* Performance gains of up to 20% over version 10.0 are provided through two
enhancements in Replication Server 10.5. The new 10.5 version has the
ability to replicate only the fields within a record that have changed
instead of the entire record, reducing network overhead. It also handles
outbound transactions more quickly through performance tuning of the
parsing feature that routes transactions to be replicated out from
Replication Server to subscribing sites.

* Greater flexibility in determining where to replicate information is now
available through dynamic transaction routing. In Replication Server 10.0,
the database administrator typically identified target subscribers. With
version 10.5, customers now have the option of allowing their applications
to identify a target subscriber at the time of a specific transaction. For
example, if a purchase order from Tennessee is received, the application
could tell Replication Server to replicate the transaction only to an
Atlanta order fulfillment center database versus one in San Diego. This
feature is expected to play an important role with the growing deployment
of workflow-type applications to manage business processes.

* Enhanced security is provided through password encryption.

Replication Server 11 Features

Replication Server 11, now in development, is expected to provide even
greater support for distributed, heterogeneous environments through the
ability to go beyond data movement to provide the replication of business
logic. Key to this is the customizable event replication capability in
Replication Server 11, which will allow the invocation of a stored
procedure within an application to trigger other - often different -
stored procedures in different locations. For example, the approval of a
loan at one bank location will be able to cause a gold credit card offer
letter to be automatically generated at a second site and trigger a
customer profile update at a third location.

Replication Server 11 is designed to provide a range of other features that
enhance the product's performance, ease of use, and support for
heterogeneous environments, including:

* Increased performance for transactions replicated from Replication
  Server into a target database via parallelization of the data
  streams.
* Enhanced warm back-up support including a one-step default process
  for initial system set-up and faster replication to a warm back-up
  site.
* New Replication Server Manager capabilities to facilitate ease of
  use, including one-step default set-up of the replication server
  environment; support for automated switch over to an alternate
  primary site in the case of a system failure; and an expanded, more
  intuitive graphical user interface.
* Internationalization through support for multiple character sets and
  localization of the documentation.
* Support for text and image data types.

Replication Server Extensions

In the second half of 1995, Sybase plans to ship extensions to Replication
Server that extend the reach of replication to the desktop and into the
world of groupware. A Replication Driver for ODBC, now in development, is
expected to provide information delivery to widely adopted desktop
databases, such as Watcom SQL, Microsoft Access and dBase IV. Together
Replication Server and the Replication Driver for ODBC will also be
expected to play a key role in delivering corporate information to nomadic
users, since Replication Server provides capabilities to re-synchronize
target databases that have been disconnected from the network.

Sybase plans to offer bi-directional access with Lotus Notes groupware via
two products, providing integration between customers' document-oriented
systems and operational environments. A version of the Replication Driver
for ODBC is being developed to provide replication from relational
database systems into Lotus Notes. Also under development is a Replication
Agent for Lotus Notes, which will allow structured data from the groupware
environment to be replicated into relational databases.

Pricing and Availability

Replication Server 10.5 is now generally available; Replication Server 11
is scheduled to ship in Q4 1995 - with upgrades of each available to
existing Replication Server 10.0 customers at no extra cost. Replication
Server is now shipping on more than 10 UNIX-based hardware platforms,
Windows NT, and NetWare. An OS/2 version is scheduled to be available in
Q2 1995. Pricing for Replication Server currently ranges from $2,800 to
$69,500 and is based on the number of servers participating either as a
data source or target subscriber for replication. General availability of
the Replication Driver for ODBC and Replication Agent for Lotus Notes is
planned for Q3 1995 and Q4 1995, respectively. No pricing has been
announced for these products.

Sybase, Inc.

Sybase, Inc., is a worldwide leader in client/server software. Sybase is
focused in the four major client/server categories: databases, tools,
database systems management and interoperability, providing desktop to
enterprise scalability. The company's mission is to provide its customers
with an open, adaptable information systems architecture that enables
rapid business change. Headquartered in Emeryville, CA, Sybase is the
seventh largest independent software company in the world.

Sybase Inc
6475 Christie Ave
Emeryville, CA 04608
510-596-3500;  Fax: 510-658-9441

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