Three companies join tech alliance

Oracle Corp., SAP AG and Siebel Systems Inc. have joined a federation of technology companies that are designing and developing a global delivery platform called the EDS Agile Enterprise Platform, officials at Plano, Texas-based EDS said.

The three companies join six others: Cisco Systems Inc., Dell Inc., EMC Corp., Microsoft Corp., Sun Microsystems Inc. and Xerox Corp. Oracle is in Redwood Shores, Calif.; SAP is in Walldorf, Germany; and Siebel is in San Mateo, Calif.

The alliance provides a framework for collaboration, EDS officials said. For example, the EDS Agility Alliance partners are working on an application modernization and integration project for the Armed Forces Personnel Administration Agency of the U.K.'s Ministry of Defence.

Working with Oracle, EDS is replacing a number of the agency's outdated systems that support more than 600,000 active and inactive military personnel. An EDS spokesperson said the alliance will be a factor in working with the U.S. government.