WSO2
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Company type | Private |
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Industry | Middleware |
Founded | August 4, 2005[1] |
Founders |
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Headquarters | , |
Number of locations | 11 (2023[2]) |
Area served | Worldwide |
Key people | |
Owner | EQT Private Capital Asia |
Number of employees | 900+[3] |
Website | wso2 |
WSO2 LLC is an open-source technology provider founded in 2005. It delivers software and cloud solutions that provide foundational technologies for application development and identity and access management (IAM).[4] This represents an expansion upon its original focus on integrating application programming interfaces (APIs), applications, and web services locally and across the Internet. In 2024, the company was taken private by EQT's fund, EQT Private Capital Asia.
History
[edit]WSO2 was founded by Sanjiva Weerawarana, Paul Fremantle, and Davanum Srinivas in August 2005, backed by Intel Capital, Toba Capital, and Pacific Controls. Weerawarana[5] was an IBM researcher and a founder of the Web services platform.[6][7] He led the creation of IBM SOAP4J,[8] which later became Apache SOAP, and was the architect of other notable projects. Fremantle was one of the authors of IBM's Web Services Invocation Framework and the Web Services Gateway.[9] An Apache member since the original Apache SOAP project, Fremantle oversaw the donation of WSIF and WSDL4J to Apache and led IBM's involvement in the Axis C/C++ project.
Fremantle was WSO2's chief technology officer (CTO) from 2008-2020,[10] [11] and was named one of InfoWorld's Top 25 CTOs his first year in the role.[12] Currently, Fremantle serves as a consultant for multiple technology companies, including WSO2.[11] In 2017, Tyler Jewell took over as CEO [13] while Weerawarana focused on the Ballerina open-source project.[14] [15] In 2019, Vinny Smith became the Executive Chairman.[16] Weerawarana returned to the role of CEO in 2020.[15]
A subsidiary, WSO2Mobile, was launched in 2013, with Harsha Purasinghe of Microimage as the CEO and co-founder.[17] In March 2015, WSO2.Telco was launched in partnership with Malaysian telecommunications company Axiata, [18] which held a majority stake in the venture.[19] WSO2Mobile has since been re-absorbed into its parent company.
EQT AB's Asian private fund EQT Private Capital Asia acquired the company for over $600 million in May 2024.[20]
Financial
[edit]In 2006, Intel Capital invested $4 million in WSO2,[21] and continued to invest in subsequent years. In 2010, Godel Technologies invested in WSO2 for an unspecified amount,[22] and in 2012 the company raised a third round of $10 million.[23][24] Official WSO2 records point to this being from Toba Capital, Cisco, and Intel Capital.[25] In August 2015, a funding round led by Pacific Controls and Toba raised another $20 million.[26][27] In November 2021, WSO2 obtained $90 million in financing from Goldman Sachs Asset Management Private Credit.[28] In May 2022, WSO2 completed its Series E funding with an additional $93 million investment from Info Edge.[29]
Open-source engagement
[edit]Historically, WSO2 has had a close connection to the Apache community, with a significant portion of their products based on or contributing to the Apache product stack.[30] Likewise, many of WSO2's top leadership have contributed to Apache projects. In 2013, WSO2 donated its Stratos project to Apache.[31][32]
WSO2 first introduced Ballerina, an open-source, general-purpose concurrent and strongly typed programming language with both textual and graphical syntaxes, optimized for integration in 2017.[33] General availability of Ballerina 1.0 at https://ballerina.io was then announced in 2019.[33][34] In a March 2023 product review, InfoWorld rated Ballerina 2201.4.0 (Swan Lake) 4 stars (out of a possible 5).[35]
Products
[edit]WSO2 products are released under the Apache License Version 2.[36] Like the Apache project itself, WSO2 follows open development principles and publishes architecture and development discussions.
Early development
[edit]WSO2's first product was code-named Tungsten and was meant for the development of web applications. Tungsten was followed by WSO2 Titanium, which later became WSO2 Enterprise Service Bus (ESB).[37]
In February 2009, WSO2 introduced the WSO2 Carbon componentized framework based on the Open Source Gateway Initiative (OSGi), designed to serve as the basis for all WSO2 software products.[38] [39] Version 5.3.0 of the open-source WSO2 Carbon Kernel was released in December 2022 and updated in January 2023.[40]
Current offerings
[edit]WSO2 offers a platform of middleware products for agile integration, application programming interface (API) management, and identity and access management.
In June 2015, WSO2 announced its first generation of software as a service (SaaS) versions of its open-source products.[41] As of Q1 2023, products include:
- WSO2 API Manager, a full life cycle API management platform which has incorporated the integration functionality of WSO2 Enterprise Integrator, since version 4.0 was introduced in 2021.[42] [43]
- Choreo, a SaaS internal developer platform to create, deploy, run, and govern APIs, integrations, and microservices on Kubernetes. WSO2 also offers Choreo API Manager and Choreo iPaaS.[44] [45] [4]
- WSO2 Micro Integrator, an integration engine with a low-code graphical designer.[46]
- WSO2 Identity Server, which provides identity management capabilities with a focus on customer identity and access management (CIAM).[47] [48]
- WSO2 Private CIAM Cloud. A cloud-hosted, managed service.[49]
- Asgardeo, an identity as a service (IDaaS) focused on CIAM.[50]
Industry recognition
[edit]The company gained recognition from a 2011 report in InformationWeek that eBay used WSO2 ESB as a key element of their transaction-processing software.[51] In 2022, InformationWeek published a podcast interview with WSO2 customer Hard Rock on “consolidating different digital customer experiences across Hard Rock's properties.” [52] Research firm Gartner noted that WSO2 was a leading competitor in the application infrastructure market of 2014.[53]
Recognition for WSO2 in the area of API management includes a rating of 4.5 out of 5 in the Gartner Peer Insights: Full Life Cycle API Management and a position in the Visionaries Quadrant of the 2022 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Full Life Cycle API Management.[54] [55] [56]
Recognition for WSO2 in the areas of identity and access management and CIAM includes a rating of 4.3 out of 5 in the Gartner Peer Insights: Access Management, a Strong Performer position in The Forrester Wave™: Customer Identity And Access Management, Q4 2022, and a Leader position in the KuppingerCole Leadership Compass: CIAM Platforms, 2022.[57] [58] [59] [48]
Operations
[edit]As of 2023, WSO2 has offices in: Mountain View, California; Austin, Texas; London, UK; São Paulo, Brazil; Sydney, Australia; Munich, Germany; Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Mumbai, India; Singapore, and Colombo, Sri Lanka. The bulk of its research and operations are conducted from its main office in Colombo.[60]
References
[edit]- ^ "Happy 19th Birthday WSO2! - Sanjiva Weerawarana". Retrieved 4 August 2024.
- ^ "WSO2: Contact Us". Retrieved 2 June 2023.
- ^ "about WSO2". WSO2. Retrieved 2 June 2023.
- ^ a b "WSO2 Home page". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-05-31.
- ^ "WSO2 Ten Years: It Takes Two to Tango! | The Source". wso2.com. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "Web Services Description Language (WSDL) 1.1" (PDF). W3C.
- ^ "Web Services Description Language (WSDL) Version 2.0 Part 1: Core Language" (PDF). W3C. 27 February 2006.
- ^ Weerawarana, Sanjiva. "10 years of SOAP!". Retrieved 2020-05-12.
- ^ "Workshop: WSO2 Integration Platform Discovery". wso2.com. Retrieved 2019-07-18.
- ^ "Sanjiva Weerawarana's Blog: Paul becomes CTO of WSO2". sanjiva.weerawarana.org. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ a b "Paul Fremantle LinkedIn profile".
- ^ "The best CTOs of 2008". InfoWorld. 2 June 2008. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "Time for a CEO change in WSO2". medium.com. 12 September 2017. Retrieved 2018-05-16.
- ^ "Ballerina - Announcing Ballerina 1.0". blog.ballerina.io. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ a b "Sanjiva Weerawarana LinkedIn Profile".
- ^ "WSO2 Update: Goodbye Tyler, Hello Vinny!". wso2.com. Retrieved 2019-04-01.
- ^ "WSO2 Launches WSO2Mobile Subsidiary to Focus on Enterprise Mobile Applications and Device Management". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "WSO2, Axiata Group partner to launch open source API platform | Daily FT". www.ft.lk. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "Axiata to invest $2.6m in US-based WSO2 Telco Inc for 70% stake". DealStreetAsia. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ Sawers, Paul (2024-05-02). "EQT snaps up API and identity management software company WSO2 for more than $600M". TechCrunch.
- ^ "WSO2 | Success Stories". www.intelcapital.com. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "GODELTECH INVESTS IN WSO2- Godel Technologies | WSO2 Inc". wso2.com. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "SEC FORM D". www.sec.gov. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "Funding Daily: A truly black Friday". VentureBeat. 15 December 2012. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "WSO2 Attracts $10 Million in Funding Following 220% Year Over Year Growth in New Customer Adoption of WSO2's Cloud and Enterprise Middleware | WSO2 Inc". wso2.com. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "SEC FORM D". www.sec.gov. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "Open Source Cloud and Middleware Company WSO2 Attracts $20 Million in Funding Led by Pacific Controls, Global Provider of Internet of Things Managed Solutions". Yahoo Finance. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "Goldman Sachs Injects $90 Million Into Low-Code Software Maker WSO2". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2023-05-31.
- ^ "WSO2 completes $93 mn series E funding with investment from Info Edge". www.business-standard.com. 2022-05-25. Retrieved 2023-05-31.
- ^ "WSO2 and the Apache Way | WSO2 Inc". wso2.com. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ Avram, Abel (24 June 2013). "WSO2 Donates Stratos to the Apache Foundation". InfoQ. Retrieved 21 September 2016.
- ^ Mayer, Chris (25 June 2013). "WSO2's DIY cloud Stratos welcomed into Apache Incubator". jaxenter. Retrieved 21 September 2016.
- ^ a b "Ballerina - Ballerina Home". ballerina.io.
- ^ Hall, Susan (2019-09-11). "Ballerina Programming Language Revamped, at 1.0". The New Stack. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ Heller, Martin (2023-03-08). "Ballerina: A programming language for the cloud". InfoWorld. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "FAQ - Enterprise Integrator 6.1.1 - WSO2 Documentation". docs.wso2.com.
- ^ "WSO2: 10 years and flying high!". www.ft.lk. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ Krill, Paul (2009-02-06). "WSO2 offers open-source, componentized SOA". Computerworld. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "WSO2 debuts Carbon Studio as a speedy IDE for SOA and composite applications-Dana Gardner,BriefingsDirect". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-06-05.
- ^ Welcome to WSO2 Carbon Kernel, WSO2, 2023-03-23, retrieved 2023-06-01
- ^ Avram, Abel (3 June 2015). "WSO2 Announces API Cloud and App Cloud". InfoQ. Retrieved 27 September 2016.
- ^ "The #1 open-source platform for building and managing APIs with ease". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "WSO2 API Manager 4.0 Adds Support for Streaming and Event-Driven Architectures". AiThority. 2021-05-05. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ Krill, Paul (2022-03-30). "WSO2 launches low-code, cloud-native PaaS for API development". InfoWorld. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "Choreo Internal Developer Platform". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "WSO2 Micro Integrator". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "Identity Server - On-Premise and in the Cloud". wso2.com.
- ^ a b "WSO2 Named An Overall Leader And A Product Leader". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "WSO2 Launches WSO2 Private CIAM Cloud to Deliver Best-in-Class CIAM Support for Both B2B and B2C Demands – TECHNOLOGY RESELLER". Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "WSO2 delivers next-level CIAM with new release of Asgardeo IDaaS at KubeCon North America 2022". itwire.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "Open Source Helps eBay Process $2000 Per Second - InformationWeek". InformationWeek. 29 July 2011. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "That DOS Won't Hunt: Hard Rock's Andre Gowens on Streamlining CX". InformationWeek. 13 December 2022. Retrieved 2023-05-31.
- ^ "Comparing Comprehensive Application Infrastructure Vendors, 2014". www.gartner.com. Retrieved 2015-11-12.
- ^ "Full Life Cycle API Management Reviews 2023 | Gartner Peer Insights". Gartner. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "Magic Quadrant for Full Life Cycle API Management". Gartner. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ Kong (2022-11-17). "Kong Named Leader in Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Full Life Cycle API Management for Third Year". Kong Inc. Retrieved 2023-06-12.
- ^ "Access Management Reviews 2023 | Gartner Peer Insights". Gartner. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "The Forrester Wave™: Customer Identity And Access..." Forrester. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "The Forrester Wave™️: Customer Identity And Access Management, Q4 2022 Names Okta a Strong Performer in Customer Identity and Access Management | Okta". www.okta.com. Retrieved 2023-06-01.
- ^ "Contact". wso2.com. Retrieved 2023-05-31.