Epicor Software has unveiled Epicor Internet Component Environment (ICE) 2.0 - the company’s next-generation service-oriented architecture (SOA) for building dynamic business applications that will exploit the capabilities of Microsoft Windows Server 2008, SQL Server 2008, and Visual Studio 2008.

Based on Web services technologies such as the Microsoft .NET Framework, Epicor ICE 2.0 (currently scheduled for release in Q2 2008) claims to deliver an adaptable SOA that will help businesses reduce costs, increase hardware utilisation, optimise infrastructure and server availability. The backbone of Epicor’s next generation resource planning (ERP) solutions, Epicor ICE 2.0 fuses Web 2.0 and Enterprise SOA concepts to deliver an adaptable framework for creating dynamic applications delivered via rich user experiences.

In addition to enhancements in the areas of business process management (BPM) and workflow orchestration, consistent with the need for greater governance risk and compliance (GRC) management and continuous performance initiatives, Epicor ICE 2.0 also includes on-premise, single-tenant hosted or multi-tenant software-as-a-service (SaaS) deployment options.

According to the official release, Epicor’s technology allows users to personalise and modify application capabilities in a single environment and then deploy simultaneously in a Windows smart client and/or Ajax-enabled browser to meet increasing demands for composite application development.