Global Exchange to buy IBM services units

Global Exchange Services announced Thursday that it has signed a deal to purchase IBM's Electronic Data Interchange and Business Exchange Services business units for an undisclosed sum of money.

The business-to-business e-commerce software maker, also known as GXS, is best recognized as the operator of an electronic trading network that processes an estimated 1 billion transactions annually. Its B2B online exchange, officially known as Trading Grid, serves for many companies the same role that electronic data interchange was originally designed for--helping business partners communicate in real-time regarding issues such as inventory status or order placement.

Executives at GXS, a spinoff of General Electric based in Gaithersburg, Md., labeled the deal a major boost to Trading Grid, which the company relaunched at the end of September. Rowland Archer, GXS's chief technology officer, said the addition of IBM's capabilities will help customers further capitalize on existing B2B strategies and tap into the potential of emerging applications such as radio frequency identification tags.

"This is another step in the realization of global B2B e-commerce," Archer said. "A lot of companies develop software that helped to pioneer this space, but at the end of the day, it's all about the size of the connected trading community."

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