NOVELL EDIRECTORY SHIPS WITH SAP PORTALS' ENTERPRISE PORTAL SOLUTION.

Novell, Inc. (Nasdaq: NOVL) provider of Net business solutions, and SAP Portals, Inc. a provider of open-enterprise portal and business intelligence products and a wholly owned subsidiary of SAP AG (NYSE: SAP), have announced that Novell's identity management software, Novell eDirectory, is being bundled with SAP Portals Enterprise Portal. With this agreement Novell supplies the LDAP directory that ships with SAP Portals Enterprise Portal, and customers have the assurance that eDirectory has proven integration with the solution. Adding the user identity management capabilities of eDirectory to the enterprise portal lowers administration costs and strengthens security by simplifying portal user management and providing identity-based access to personalized portal resources.

Today, people increasingly rely on information from diverse sources, such as business applications, databases, e-mail and the Internet, to get business done. A need to unify these resources has driven the deployment of enterprise portals, which bring together applications and information into a single view and deliver them seamlessly to users. Directories, which store user identity information, simplify the management of these portal solutions, by allowing companies to control access to portal resources and personalize those resources based on a user's role and responsibility in the company. SAP Portals takes advantage of these directory-based benefits by supporting a full range of industry standards, including LDAP.

"SAP Portals Enterprise Portal enables customers to collaborate, make responsive business decisions and increase speed and efficiency by bringing together every piece of critical information inside and outside the enterprise and delivering it efficiently to users," said Gil Perez, vice president, Global Alliances and Partners, SAP Portals, Inc. "Adding Novell eDirectory to that infrastructure gives SAP Portals customers a simplified and effective way to manage user identities, which ultimately lowers administrative overhead and provides stronger security.

"SAP Portals chose to include eDirectory as part of the enterprise portal solution because the product's scalability, performance and tremendous market adoption make it an ideal complement to SAP Portals Enterprise Portal deployments," Perez added.

"The cooperation between Novell and SAP Portals presents some very compelling solutions for customers," said Paul Smart, vice president and general manager of Novell's Net Directory business. "The addition of Novell's technology to SAP Portals Enterprise Portal gives customers a manageable, low-cost solution that supports integration with a wide range of systems throughout the enterprise."

Novell eDirectory is now shipping with SAP Portals Enterprise Portal.