(September 23, 2002) - To help businesses leverage the Internet as a competitive advantage, BEA Systems, Inc. and Sun Microsystems, Inc., are planning a new joint support center to support BEA and Sun customers. This global support relationship will be designed to speed time to resolution and increase application availability for scalable, Internet-ready solutions. This support relationship can also help provide lab environments in all regions worldwide for the purpose of testing interoperability between BEA WebLogic and Sun's Java Virtual Machine software and the Solaris Operating Environment. With this new support model, BEA and Sun can provide enhancements to the established Sun(SM) Vendor Integration (SunVIP(SM)) Program and help provide faster response times to customer related issues, to minimize system downtime and achieve full interoperability. The Joint Support Center will help provide one-call service initiation; specialized programs focused on supporting the BEA on Sun integrated application infrastructure; a cooperative support agreement to provide rapid interoperability resolutions; predefined escalation processes that will streamline issues resolution; and access to engineers trained on both BEA and Sun products. The Joint Support Center will be available to customers with Sun's SunSpectrum Platinum(SM) and SunSpectrum Gold(SM) contracts and with BEA's Mission Critical and Production Support contracts.