Oasis, a group backed by both IBM and the United Nations, has agreed to adopt the e-commerce standards being developed by Microsoft Corp. The agreement not only ends the standards dispute between the technology giants, but also starts a common e-commerce format for direct businesses.
Called Simple Object Access Protocol, or SOAP, the Microsoft e-commerce system has been handed to the World Wide Web Consortium for ratification in May.
However, IBM, along with a group of over 125 other technology companies, will continue to develop its system, ebXML (Extensible Markup Language), maintaining the effort include more than what overlapped with Microsoft’s SOAP.
In a separate development, Oasis is seeking nominations for four executive to serve on its board of directors. Nominations are open to the entire industry.
The board has eight directors, each serving two-year terms, which are staggered to preserved continuity. This year, Eric Garcia of Sabre, Alan Hestor of Xerox, Bill Smith of Sun Microsystems, and Robert Sutor of IBM will complete their terms.
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