Sigma Commerce Suite

As noted in the June eCSForum newsletter, Sigma Micro has acquired the Intellectual Property Rights to the Quark Commerce Suite. I promised more information as soon as it was available.

According to Sigma's President, Joe Swern, the acquisition provides a major boost to a development project that Sigma had begun nine months ago to migrate to a .Net environment. Much of the Quark functionality was consistent with their own development, and the company will undertake a "gap analysis" in the next few months to determine what needs to be added to meet the needs of the current Controller+ installed base. They anticipate that only a few database changes will be required in implementing a true N-Tier application suite.

Sigma will also be converting the .Net 1 platform of the Quark product to .Net 2, which provides improved scalability and performance of applications with improved caching, application deployment and support for a broader array of browsers and devices with ASP.NET 2.0 controls and services.

The new product, expected to be available before the end of the year, will be fully multi-channel, and available in a browser interface on a hosted or a licensed basis. They expect the deal with Quark to be finalized by July 7.

I am still waiting to clarify some technical details with Sigma's technical staff. For the moment, it appears that the Quark system has found a very approprate new home that will redound very well to the benefit of Sigma's user base, and to anyone looking for a broadly functional direct commerce order management system using some of the latest Microsoft tools and technologies.