TITLE GUARANTY OF HAWAII SAYS ALOHA AND HELLO TO WEB SERVICES FOR COBOL APPLICATIONS WITH MICRO FOCUS

- Implementation of existing COBOL application as SOA will save company estimated 75 person-years in time and effort-

ROCKVILLE, Md., and NEWBURY, England, Nov. 8, 2006 - Micro Focus® (LSE: MCRO.L), a leading provider of core system application development and deployment solutions, today announces that Title Guaranty of Hawaii, the largest Title and Escrow service company in the Aloha state, has successfully extended a key existing COBOL application to a Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA), using the Micro Focus COBOL suite of developer tools. In doing so, Title Guaranty estimates it will save 75 person-years in time and effort compared to rewriting its application from scratch.

Faced with increased pressures to deliver more functionality for its Real Property Tax Assessment System (RPTAS) using new third-party packages, as well as integrating it with their internal Windows applications, Title Guaranty had three options - rip and replace RPTAS from scratch, build their own custom application to have similar functions to the third party package, or extend the current system to Windows and access the third-party and other Windows software via Web services. RPTAS is a UNIX server-based business critical legacy application written in COBOL, while the internal Windows web browser reporting system and the third-party software for property address validation is based on the Microsoft Windows .NET framework.

"Micro Focus is clearly aligning COBOL applications with major technology changes in our industry," said Jerry Opedal, vice president of computer support at Title Guaranty. "With the ability now to integrate the latest third-party software into our core COBOL systems, through the use of a Web service interface, we are improving our data quality, data access, product development, turnaround time and cost effectiveness."

The modernized application was developed with COBOL tools including Micro Focus Server Express™ for UNIX and Micro Focus Net Express® for Windows. Title Guaranty was able to reuse more than 156,000 lines of COBOL code and start the move to a SOA with no delay. With the new Web service now implemented, RPTAS is now able to make calls from its Sun Solaris platform to the Windows applications, improving data sharing between the applications as well as overall system performance. Utilizing this unique approach meant Title Guaranty did not have to expend any development resources to create an in-house address validation utility. It was able to retain the proven power and stability of the COBOL platform, and deploy the upgraded RPTAS to a SOA using the high-performance Micro Focus Server™ for SOA engine.

"Organizations are no longer faced with the dilemma of having to throw away business-critical assets in order to integrate with the latest technology advances," said Stuart McGill, vice president of worldwide marketing at Micro Focus. "Companies like Title Guaranty know that SOA and web services are fantastic solutions to this dilemma because they provide new levels of power and flexibility to existing proven applications. Micro Focus is pleased to be working closely with Title Guaranty on their application modernization efforts."

"The true value of SOA when it comes to existing COBOL applications is that it makes it possible to integrate COBOL assets with other technology more quickly and cost-effectively than ever before." said Gary Barnett, research director at Ovum. "The ability to re-use existing software assets, and integrate them with newer technologies like PHP via Web services is a huge benefit, as it takes away the need to rewrite applications that work perfectly well - removing all of the cost and risk associated with that kind of effort."

Micro Focus - Unlocking the Value of Legacy™

Micro Focus is a leading provider of legacy development and deployment software for enterprise platforms. Micro Focus enables organizations to reduce costs and increase agility with minimal risk by reusing their legacy applications with contemporary architectures and Web services. Founded in 1976, Micro Focus is a global company with principal offices in the United Kingdom, United States, Germany and Japan. For more information, visit www.microfocus.com.

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