back to article IBM sues Micro Focus, claims it copied Big Blue mainframe software

IBM has filed a lawsuit against Micro Focus, alleging the enterprise software company copied and reverse-engineered its CICS mainframe service to develop a rival product, the Micro Focus Enterprise Server. Big Blue has brought the case in the US District Court in New York, citing violation of copyright law and claiming that …

  1. Roger Kynaston

    Lawyers response

    Kerching!

  2. blackcat Silver badge
    Pint

    CICS is still a thing?

    Now I feel old. The last time I heard that name was in the late 90's at IBM Hurlsey.

    A beer for all the lunches spent at the clubhouse.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: CICS is still a thing?

      Same here. Haven’t heard of it since I worked at the CEGB (now powergen?) in 1987….

      1. vcragain

        Re: CICS is still a thing?

        You forget that many hundreds of smaller companies have ancient software that they rely on to do business, wishing to upgrade does not pay for upgrades, so what works is still in use. I worked from 1990 to 2015 or so at a company that had inherited it's systems from a prior owner of itself, and had no choice but to use the ancient software, So CICS & multiple mainframe systems were 'it'. Many of them were in process of being migrated in bits & pieces to PC alternatives, but it was extremely messy. However if something works it is not in the interests of a corporation to get rid of it to satisfy the ambitions of younger IT people - the business is all that counts, as it should be ! Having a master plan to roll over to more modern concepts is the way to go, but in my experience those with the control over such things are not necessarily the people who have enough knowledge to make those choices - hence the stalemate & lack of a coherent plan. IOW 'nobody listens to me' is the problem !

        1. blackcat Silver badge

          Re: CICS is still a thing?

          It is a testament to an older age of IBM that CICS has stood the test of time and that it is still doing what is needed some 50 years later. If it is still supported, works as needed and costs less than moving to something new then stick with it.

          The company I work for is having SAP inflicted upon it by the corporate overlords BUT they are moving to SAP version+1 with a different EPDM front end (windchill rather than cideon) next year so we will then go through another transition...

          I used to work for a company where I'm sure one of the board members thought "big companies use Oracle, we are a big company, we should use Oracle". After 5 years, untold airmiles moving people around the world for training and brainstorming and a lot of money they rolled it out to ONE site before the project died.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: CICS is still a thing?

            Quote from above:

            "those with the control over such things are not necessarily the people who have enough knowledge to make those choices - hence the stalemate & lack of a coherent plan."

          2. Roland6 Silver badge

            Re: CICS is still a thing?

            >one of the board members thought "big companies use Oracle, we are a big company, we should use Oracle"

            Way back I had a client who was a successful mortgage broker handling >£100M of funds. Their datacenter was a rack of NetWare servers, the plan in-progress was to replace these with a microvax cluster. The business wanting to improve their image with their City customers (who provided the monies for the mortgage products) recruited a new CEO from the City. One of the new CEO's first dictates was that the IT should be replaced by a suitably large IBM system... I seem to remember the company disappeared a few years later...

    2. MyffyW Silver badge

      Re: CICS is still a thing?

      "might see the customer rebuild their application on something else, like SAP S4/HANA"

      Gartner, you really are the mean, coercive boyfriend of management consultancy.

    3. TimMaher Silver badge
      Windows

      Re: CICS is still a thing?

      I get my CICS from VM.

      Famous song.

      1. Sean o' bhaile na gleann

        Re: CICS is still a thing?

        The number 66 bus between Romsey and Winchester goes past Hursley Grange

        "Get your CICS on route 66..."

        1. Jellied Eel Silver badge

          Re: CICS is still a thing?

          "Get your CICS on route 66..."

          See also-

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PinCg7IGqHg

          "I wanna call her on the 3174"

          Ah, those teenage years, locked inside a datacentre with little more than LU6.2 to keep me entertained..

    4. John Geek

      Re: CICS is still a thing?

      last time I looked at some CICS code was in college in 1973, and quickly decided I didn't want anything to do with it.

    5. TeeCee Gold badge
      Meh

      Re: CICS is still a thing?

      Remember the London Ambulance Service fiasco[1]? That was an attempt to do serious, real world, realtime transaction processing using something other than CICS as the TPM to manage it. A highly regarded product which IBM had bought out to do the job, as "open systems" was a "must have" in the contract so they couldn't use big iron to do it properly[1].

      The fix adopted was to give up on the new fangled stuff and port CICS to UNIX...

      [1] Nothing really qualifies as a fiasco without quantifiable deaths.

      [2] Correct lesson to learn here is: Never let some evangelical dickhead specify the hardware, no matter how on trend they are...

    6. Velv
      Coat

      Re: CICS is still a thing?

      Alec Guinness voice: "Now there's a name I haven't heard in a long time"

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Meanwhile, Micro Focus is itself in the process of being acquired by Canadian outfit OpenText in a deal said to be worth $6 billion."

    Ever think that might have something to do with the timing?

    1. GruntyMcPugh

      Hmm, Micro Focus has a market cap of £1.75Bn an earned $2.9Bn last year, so that $6Bn appears to have chummed the water somewhat.

    2. oolazag

      Timing is everything, although I think this is more (indirectly) aimed at AWS and their re:Invent conference next week in Vegas. AWS embeds Micro Focus Enterprise Server tech in its mainframe migration cloud solution.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I did a left and shift migration over a decade ago.

    A longstanding mainframe application was cloned onto a hybrid stack, using a Linux front end, Windows application tier running Microfocus, AIX data tier.

    It ran well enough apart from the move having exposed the number of data calls happening (internally on the mainframe) across the network.

    There was no real reason for the replatform aside from a CIO who had decided "no more new mainframe projects" and had that that adopted as a principle before leaving.

    Usually the issue is the age of the code (and the coders) not the platform. Ropy old code written for green screen remains so when ported.

    z/OS is called "closed source" for a reason, there's no way of making something run like an IBM mainframe without doing it the way that mainframe does it.

  5. TVU

    IBM sues Micro Focus, claims it copied Big Blue mainframe software

    When any large tech company resorts to litigation to get its way (Hi, Larry!) then that's a sure sign that the company concerned is becoming increasingly irrelevant and is entering a state of senescent decay.

    1. CrazyOldCatMan Silver badge

      Re: IBM sues Micro Focus, claims it copied Big Blue mainframe software

      Ironically, I seem to remember Micro Focus doing a form of IBMs' VM-CMS many years ago (pre-1996!) - I was working at an IBM-only place and we were looking to see if some of the processing could be shifted off the mainframe.

      Sadly, the '99% compatibility' excluded one of the main things we wanted it for' (can't remember what - lots of miles and alcohol since then!)

  6. TechnicalVault

    Venue and jurisdiction is going to complicate this

    The UK's Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 section 50B [legislation.gov.uk] which allows reverse engineering for interoperability and explicitly says: "Where an act is permitted under this section, it is irrelevant whether or not there exists any term or condition in an agreement which purports to prohibit or restrict the act (such terms being, by virtue of section 296A, void)", is going to likely make this an interestingly expensive case.

    1. Andy E

      Re: Venue and jurisdiction is going to complicate this

      As they are being sued in New York I'm not sure that UK law will prevail.

      1. Roland6 Silver badge

        Re: Venue and jurisdiction is going to complicate this

        The complaint filing seems to be specifically targeting Micro Focus Inc (the US subsidiary of Micro Focus plc) and its distribution of certain products to New York-based companies.

        A win for IBM would I suspect mean US law trumps UK law, when it comes to products being distributed (ie. not necessarily directly sold to US-base companies).

      2. david 12 Silver badge

        Re: Venue and jurisdiction is going to complicate this

        US law is the same -- specifically to protect third-party automobile compatibility. (Americans take their cars seriously). The restrictions aren't on intent or outcome or contract: the restrictions (as in this case) are on direct copying.

  7. IncreasinglyDisaffected
    Coat

    Missed opportunity

    It's a shame it's an eight hour drive from OpenText's Waterloo offices to Chicago. Otherwise, you could almost Get Your CICS, on Route 66. (I'll just get my coat now and leave, thanks)

    1. MyffyW Silver badge

      Re: Missed opportunity

      You, Sir, owe me a new keyboard. An old IBM Model M for preference ...

    2. Anonymous IV
      Alert

      Re: Missed opportunity

      If you were an American you would have called the product "C" "I" "C" "S" (four letters, sounded separately). They tended to get Very Cross when we Britishers pronounced it as one word, "Kicks".

      Similarly with "D" "O" "S" and "Doss"...

      1. Sceptic Tank Silver badge

        Re: Missed opportunity

        An American gentlemen pointed me out in a meeting for calling SQL "Sequel" instead of Essqueuehell.

        Not so sure about "D" "O" "S", though. Charles Petzold himself pointed out that it's pronounced "Dahs".

  8. Charles Smith

    History strikes back

    CICS? Wasn't that the navigation software on Noah's Ark?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: History strikes back

      Kind of.

      He tried to upgrade to it but, in true IBM fashion, it was late and not delivered to the ark on time. Noah had to go back to using a dove. Efficient and cost a lot less to run.

  9. Geekgirl

    70-80% of the world's data is on mainframe

    One of the most nonsensical things I've seen is moving technology needlessly or for political talking points. It's stupid.

    70-80% of the words database on mainframe db2. All the top fortune companies use it. The only reason I can discern for the move is everyone wanted a piece of the IBM pie. IBM messed this up by not taking a different tack, but that's water under the bridge.

    The next generation of technologists will be wealthy if they learn mainframe, along with the toy software. zExplore (formerly Master the Mainframe) is the key.

  10. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Unhappy

    For those who don't know why you see CICS it's simple.

    CICS dates (originally) from the days when I/O in COBOL mean I) Read a punched card O)Write a line of text to a line printer.

    So the concept of a dumb terminal, whose input changed between reads and a screen you re-wrote sections of, was clearly the devils work.

    Hence CICS exists to put a punched-card-and-line-printer wrapper on these new-fangled dumb terminals and their meatsack operators. And random access storage devices How is that even possible?

    And yes it is a key enabling part of a lot of mainframe based businesses, including banking but also (or it used to be) the various catalogue shopping companies (maximum reliability, minimum cost per transaction).

    Some say it's only Micro Focus's unswerving support for mainframes (especially of the IBM variety) that's kept them in the game for large organisations, but that may be an exaggeration.

    So I guess they'd be even more p**sed at the company that installed the mother of TSRs on their shiny new Z/os box then? But that's a story for another day.

  11. Stu J

    UK Case Law

    If this was in the UK, I doubt IBM would win given this precedent:

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navitaire_Inc_v_Easyjet_Airline_Co._and_BulletProof_Technologies,_Inc.

    However, as it's being heard in the US, who knows what will happen - the only certainty is enriched lawyers.

    1. david 12 Silver badge

      Re: UK Case Law

      " Curiously, it was not claimed that Defendant had access to the original source code or that Defendant's source code resembled Plaintiff's in any way"

      So, not in any way comparable to this case. The pivotal points of this case are the claim that the defendant had developer access and that the software is a derivative work

      So, did developers have access to source code? Yes. Look at the background:

      "Because of the limited capacity of even large processors of that era every CICS installation was required to assemble the source code for all of the CICS system modules after completing a process similar to system generation (sysgen), called CICSGEN, to establish values for conditional assembly-language statements. "

      CICS source code moved from "partly developed by customers", to "implemented and debugged by customers" to "partly developed, implemented and debugged by licensed developers"

  12. Paul 195
    WTF?

    Long History

    IBM and Micro Focus have long history as the best of frenemies. In the early 90s they co-operated very closely on CICS-OS2 - IBM provided the CICS and MF brought the COBOL compiler and run-time for X86. When Enterprise Server first started being sold as a way to lift and shift from the mainframe to lower-cost platforms Micro Focus ended up in IBM's cross hairs for several years.

    I don't know how IBM as an institution could claim to have "only become recently aware" of the situation. I think the poster who said this is a lot to do with Micro Focus partnering with AWS has hit the nail on the head. The last time IBM were this cross with Micro Focus it was because of a close relationship with Microsoft. IBM here has all the hallmarks of the abusive ex...

  13. This post has been deleted by its author

  14. Velv
    Trollface

    The year is 9990

    Somewhere in a graveyard Scientists are resurrecting developers who died in the early 21st Century.

    "Ah, good, you're awake. We think you might know something about adding extra digits in to dates in computer programs"

    1. LateAgain

      You KNOW they'd wait until 9999

  15. Larry D

    Who ported CICS to AIX?

    In 1995 I installed and configured CICS/6000 on AIX (not my normal DBA job but they had no one else who could spell CICS available). My impression was that the CICS port was written by MicroFocus. I seem to recall Microfocus copyright notices coming up with the IBM ones. Maybe I'm wrong but this case is a little weird to me.

  16. Peterong8Sales

    Any update for Feb 2023?

    OpenText has just completed the acquisition of Micro Focus.

    Anyone knows what happened with the IBM lawsuit on the copyright infringement as of Feb 2023?

  17. cschneid

    Update?

    According to a blog entry by Mark J. Barrenechea, OpenText's CEO & CTO, regarding IBM's complaint the "Southern District of New York has just issued an Order, dismissing the breach of contract claim altogether."

    I cannot find any reference to the order or indeed the case itself on the court's website but that may just be my lack of navigational skills or familiarity with legal terminology.

    There remains Count I, the copyright infringment.

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