Serena Software Joins Valtech in Agile Software Development Services Partnership

   On-demand and just-in-time coaching will extend Agile programming best

                      practices across the enterprise



    REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Aug. 5 /EMWNews/ -- A new partnership

announced today between application lifecycle management (ALM) leader

Serena Software and Valtech, a global provider of strategic software

consulting, lean and agile-focused software engineering, skills training

and coaching, promises to usher in a new era of Agile software development

in the enterprise. Building on its commitment to support the exponential

growth of Agile methodologies in the enterprise, Serena is combining its

enterprise IT tool-making expertise with Valtech's transformation, coaching

and education techniques to help corporate employees make use of Agile

processes quickly and on-demand, without extensive prior training.



    Agile is an iterative software development methodology that promotes

team collaboration and adaptability throughout a project lifecycle. It's

faster and more responsive than the traditional waterfall model, which

takes a purely sequential approach to creating software. As a result, Agile

developers deliver software that more closely matches actual customer needs

more quickly, since "user stories" replace "specs" in the application

development process.



    "Agile development methodologies are seeing tremendous adoption in ISVs

and IT departments of all sizes," said Jeremy Burton, CEO of Serena. "We

are committed to delivering a pure-Agile toolset via SaaS later this year

and are delighted to have Valtech as our partner of choice as we roll that

toolset out to market."



    Attendees of the Agile 2008 conference in Toronto

(http://www.agile2008.org/) will be able to experience the new partnership

firsthand at the "Agile Story Corps Booth," where conference goers can

record personal stories about their Agile experiences. These stories will

influence support for Agile in Serena products and services. An extension

of the Agile methodology Serena uses to develop products, Agile Story Corps

is a way to incorporate users as a part of the development team. This

allows Serena products to better meet the needs of its users.



    Serena will also be sponsoring free Agile training at the Serena TAG

conference taking place September 10-11 in Santa Clara, California.



    "Valtech enables organizations to leapfrog the endemic challenges that

early Agile and Lean adopters have encountered when attempting to catalyze

strategic organizational and personal change within the software and

product development lifecycle. A focus on developer adoption without an

equal focus on corporate and business alignment has consistently proved

ineffective," said Brad Murphy, CEO of Valtech North America."



    "Valtech's OnDemand Learning, Training and Organizational change

programs identify only those Agile and Lean outcomes that organizations can

and should adopt -- and do so in ways that lead to quick wins crucial to

winning support for sustaining the outcomes that Agile and Lean can

provide," Murphy said. "Together, Serena and Valtech will ensure that

business stakeholders, product owners and engineering teams can all equally

succeed at acquiring the skill and value that Agile tools and best

practices offer across the entire software and product development team

while moving quickly to adoption and showing a compelling business return."



    Serena and Valtech jointly will support Serena Agile development tools

with training and documentation delivered in a variety of flexible formats,

including:



    -- On Demand: tools and process training for individuals over the Web

through the Serena community at http://community.serena.com



    -- Just in time: 10-minute task-specific training for individuals to

help beef up skills before taking a specific step; and




    -- Traditional training: available as needed.

    About Valtech



    Valtech is a global provider of high performance enterprise software

development, outsourcing, and organizational transformation services.

Valtech offers strategic software consulting, lean and agile-focused

software engineering, skills training and coaching. The company partners

with customers as no development company dares to, by sharing the risk and

return of development. Valtech's OnDemand services are focused on one

single outcome: Delivering business agility. Serving customers across a

variety of industries, including finance, travel, energy, media, high-tech

and online, Valtech OnDemand offerings result in priority business ideas

and products converted to working, tested and deployable software every two

weeks. Headquartered in Dallas, Valtech North America is a leading member

of the Agile Alliance and Agile Project Leadership Network. For more

information, please visit http://www.valtech.us/us/index.html



    About Serena Software, Inc.



    Serena is a privately owned company, headquartered in Redwood City,

California, with 29 offices in 14 countries and almost 1,000 employees.

Serena provides software on premise and on demand to over 15,000 customers

including 96 of the Fortune 100. Serena enables teams of programmers to

become more efficient by standardizing and automating development processes

across both mainframe and distributed environments. Serena enables IT

business analysts and power users to improve productivity with a new

generation of Web 2.0 tools to build Business Mashups. Business Mashups

automate common, everyday processes, are visual and do not require coding.

Serena also enables IT executives to gain visibility into their projects,

resources and costs - CIO's should have access to the same quality of

information about IT as the CFO has about Finance. For more information on

Serena, visit http://www.serena.com/



    Serena is a registered trademark of Serena Software, Inc. All other

product or company names may be trademarks of their respective owners, and

their use is intended for identification purposes only and not in

association with or as sponsorship or endorsement by such owners. Copyright

(C) 2008 Serena Software, Inc. All Rights Reserved.