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By Mel Duvall
Compuware struck a deal Wednesday to purchase Web optimization vendor Gomez for $295 million in cash. Together the companies plan to bring to market an offering that will allow companies to optimize the performance of their applications from behind the firewall through to the Internet and increasingly onto the cloud.
"For business and IT executives who are moving more business-critical applications onto the Internet, Compuware can now offer unified visibility, isolation and resolution of application performance problems from the data center to the customer," Compuware president and COO Bob Paul said in a statement. "Competitive offerings only cover isolated portions of the enterprise-Internet application delivery chain."
Detroit-based Compuware provides software and services that help companies improve the performance of their in-house applications. Its customer base includes 46 of the top 50 Fortune 500 companies, and it achieved sales of $1.1 billion in fiscal 2009. The company employs about 4,275 people in 84 offices around the globe.
Lexington, Mass.-based Gomez helps customers with a similar challenge, except that it focuses on the performance of applications and Web sites beyond the firewall. Its platform helps companies test and measure the performance of their Web applications across a variety of browser platforms, devices and geographies. The company, which claims more than 2,500 customers worldwide, has about 272 employees and reached $47 million in revenue in fiscal 2008.
In an interview with CIOZone, Mark Hillman, Compuware's VP of strategy, said the deal has been in the works for three to five months. The companies were aware of each other's products and the possible link between the two offerings, and in recent months had begun working with joint customers to try to bridge the gap between the two platforms.
Hillman noted that many of today's Web applications are based or connected to applications that are behind the firewall. It no longer makes sense to test, measure and optimize those applications in two separate worlds -- companies want to be able to get the complete picture.
Imad Mouline, chief technology officer for Gomez, said the bottom line is companies want to be able to measure and improve the end-user experience. "It's about having a true view of how your application will fare in the real world," he said. "With a joint offering we'll be able to determine where the bottlenecks are, whether they're inside or outside the firewall."
The deal is expected to close in November. The companies said substantially all employees, including the leadership team, are expected to remain with Compuware.
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