In October Microsoft finally got SOA (kind of)... now has it got BPM?

I've not had a briefing on Microsoft's BPM initiative, but I did see the announcement of the Business Process Alliance partner initiative. And I also read Sandy on Microsoft's BPM presentation at the Gartner BPM event - and I for one pretty much always go with what Sandy thinks around BPM.

It's interesting that on Microsoft's website both BPM and SOA topics live within the BizTalk product pages. That might tell you all you need to know. Knowing what I know about Microsoft's software infrastructure market approaches generally, I'm not at all surprised that the meat of its BPM story seems to be "Sharepoint + BizTalk".

Of course Microsoft isn't the only big software platform player giving themselves a BPM makeover - IBM is at it too. Like Microsoft, it's reacting to customer demand for help with BPM initiatives. Revitalised offerings are pledged to arrive soon.

It looks like Microsoft is cooking plans to create a more compelling "proper" BPM proposition over time as the Windows Workflow Foundation gets inserted as a common process automation engine into future BizTalk and Sharepoint releases, but we'll have to wait and see. Just the other day MS announced BPEL 1.1 support on Workflow Foundation, implemented as a Domain Specific Language (DSL), but there are currently no plans to support BPMN. Public commitments for delivering Biztalk on Workflow Foundation are currently vague - beyond saying "in the Longhorn Server timeframe".

If I learn any more I will share!