The Evolution of Sonar

Although it seems like eons ago, it’s only been a little over a year and a half since we announced Sonar at SharePoint Conference 2008. It’s been a long and interesting journey, starting with some very rough code that we used internally on development projects and culminating in the release of Sonar Standard. Since then we’ve helped customers all over the world analyze and optimize their SharePoint sites. We’ve also learned a lot about ourselves – what it takes to build a successful product, how to support clients in numerous time zones, and the importance of partnerships. Most of all, we learned that turning a professional services company into a product company is not an undertaking for the faint of heart – it takes a completely different mindset, a drastically altered business model, and a shift in the types of people at all levels of the organization.

In the end, we discovered that we were really good at services and not so good at product support and marketing. Along the way we formed partnerships will vendors who have cracked the code, so to speak, for marketing SharePoint tools, and whose product portfolios could be enhanced by the addition of a tool like Sonar. Today we are officially announcing that Idera has acquired Sonar and will be taking it forward as SharePoint Performance Manager. You can read the press release here:

http://www.idera.com/Action/Show.aspx?ThisQuery=NewsDetail&ThisID=198

We are excited to be working with Idera on the evolution of SharePoint performance analysis tools. We will continue to be engaged in the process of delivering features that customers want and innovating towards new and better solutions. In addition, BinaryWave will include SharePoint Performance Manager as part of our Performance Optimization services, working with enterprise customers to help realize the full potential of their investment in SharePoint products and technologies.

It’s the end of the Sonar era but the beginning of a new and even more exciting era for us, our customers, and the entire SharePoint performance space. Details on the release of SharePoint Performance Manager will be released in the next few days; meanwhile, come visit us at the Idera booth in the SharePoint Conference 2009 exhibit hall for a demonstration of the new product. You’re gonna love it!