As companies begin to spend valuable IT dollars on compliance - AMR Research estimated in an AMR Research Alert, December 8, 2003, that Sarbanes-Oxley compliance spending will exceed $5.5B in 2004 - both IT administrators and business managers are looking for tools that not only address specific governance criteria but also contribute to long-term efforts in creating an integrated, agile organization. According to The AMR Research Alert, March 8, 2004 by John Hagerty, Vice President, Research "With such intense focus on short-term compliance, companies sometimes miss the real long-range objective: a better managed and optimally performing organization."

To achieve this end, customers are increasingly turning to DataMirror's LiveBusiness(tm) software solutions as a key component of their comprehensive data integration, protection and monitoring plans to better manage and protect data stored in various systems and applications.

DataMirror LiveAudit(tm) software, part of the LiveBusiness product family, enables customers to monitor all adds, updates, and deletes made to corporate information at the database level, and record these changes in a chronological event log, allowing CEOs and CFOs to provide sufficient audit trail evidence to shareholders and auditors. By allowing customers to track all activities that take place within enterprise systems, organizations can achieve an added degree of system security - a core requirement for SOX compliance.

"As customers embark on compliance initiatives, a real need is emerging for technology solutions that solve today's requirements but also prepare information systems for future regulations," says Nigel Stokes, CEO, DataMirror. "Capitalizing on solutions that provide real-time visibility into both financial and operational data, such as data integration and auditing technologies, will create an environment that can respond to regulatory challenges while driving business performance and supporting the needs of customers, partners and employees."

According to Hagerty in the AMR Research Alert, dated March 8, 2004, enterprises should "build out an architecture for repeatability and reuse.... this will reduce expense over time and give the company a nimble platform for managing governance, risk, compliance, and performance in an integrated way."

For more information regarding DataMirror's LiveAudit(tm) software, contact Larry Stegman at 616.451.2500 or e-mail lstegman@arbsol.com