CrossRoads gets new look

CrossRoads Software said today that it has changed its name and has completed a $25 million round of financing.

The company, now called CrossWorlds Software, is one of a handful of players in the booming market for providing software that links a company's existing hodge-podge of packaged applications, custom-written software, and database applications into working business applications.

CrossWorlds said the new investors include Compaq Computer (CPQ), business application makers J.D.Edwards (JDEC) and Manugistics, and two Japanese technology companies, Omron and Kanematsu.

CrossWorlds and Compaq will engage in joint marketing, and Compaq systems will become the reference platform for CrossWorlds, the company said.

CEO Katrina Garnett said the company changed its name in order to establish a unique identity. She said more than 30 companies in the Bay Area alone are called Crossroads.

The company last month shipped its first application, called CrossWorlds Customer Interaction, for linking packaged business applications so that they can share data. For instance, the software can establish a connection between front-office customer services applications from companies such as Aurum or Vantive and back-office application packages from SAP, Peoplesoft, and Baan.

The software is the latest entry in a new category of tools that let corporate developers quickly link multiple dissimilar applications without extensive hand coding or outside systems integration help, analysts said.

CrossWorld's competitors include Vitria Technology and Oberon.