OpenROAD provides the capabilities to develop robust, scalable client/server and n-tier applications against databases such as Ingres, Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, and DB2 UDB.

Many business demands now are driven by the Internet, leading to a greater need for true distributed applications. (A distributed or n-tier application can be separated into any number of logical tiers using reusable components. These tiers operate in multiple configurations, using any number of physical computers.) OpenROAD enables development of Rich Internet Applications that can access services deployed in an OpenROAD Server.

The OpenROAD Server lets you reuse existing application logic while you develop new client applications using OpenROAD, or other disparate technologies such as .NET and Java. These applications can access existing data from mainframes and distributed databases through Enterprise Database Connectivity (EDBC) and Enterprise Access.