IBM and Fair Isaac have expanded their cooperative efforts into a joint strategic and global marketing alliance. Under an agreement announced on Wednesday, Fair Isaac's enterprise decision management solutions, which typically support decision-making in industries such as finance, insurance and healthcare, will be centered around IBM's service-oriented architecture (SOA) products.
Fair Isaac plans to embed its solutions into various IBM middleware, including "DB2, WebSphere, Rational tools, Lotus software, including Portal, and the IBM System z and System p platforms," according to an announcement issued by the companies. These embedded solutions will be jointly sold by the two companies.
The deal cements a partnership that goes back to 2002, according to Mark Hanny, IBM's vice president for strategic partnerships.