But Highland Software Inc isn’t the only licence management company pursuing the Common Open Software Environment crew and wanting to be declared the standard. Over in Mountain View, California, Elan Computer Group Inc says it too has been in contact COSE parties about standardising around ELM, its Elan Licence Manager. In a letter to our sister paper Unigram.X last week, Elan president Ken Greer contested Highland’s claim that its Flexlm system is the industry’s de facto Unix network licensing standard. Based on figures collected for an unattributed market survey, he maintained that 40% of the Unix software shipped worldwide uses ELM versus 60% going to Flexlm and claimed that the shares would flip-flop in the next 12 months, apparently because of deals Elan has cut with major concerns such as AT&T Co, Apple Computer Inc, Autodesk Inc and Sparc International Inc. Greer contends that Elan has a large enough piece of the the market to invalidate any claims by Highland that Flexlm in the ‘industry de facto standard.’ Gradient Technologies Inc, which Highland appears to be competing against, was unmentioned. Greer claims ELM’s interoperability, as demonstrated by the fact that it now also support Microsoft Corp Windows and Windows NT, makes it an ideal technology for the cross-system needs of COSE. Greer also took a shot at Highland’s dispute with Flexlm co-developer Globetrotter Software Inc, now in arbitration, that is clouding ownership and notes that Elan remains legally unencumbered.
