May 17, 2006

Dear Valued Sybase Customer:

Sybase is changing support of the third-party ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider for Adaptive Server Enterprise (ASE).  To ensure continuing support of your ASE system, users of ODBC and OLE DB for Sybase ASE versions 12.5.x and 15.x will need to take specific actions outlined below as soon as possible.  Sybase is committed to the success of your migration. Please see the information below on the specifics of this change and how to get help.

New ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider
Sybase has developed its own ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider for ASE.  Beginning immediately, all 15.0 versions of ASE, Windows SDK and PC-Client contain the new Sybase ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider.  The previous third-party ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider do not ship with these 15.0 software versions. 

The new ODBC driver and OLE DB Provider have also been included in 12.5.x releases of ASE (12.5.3 and later) and Windows SDK (12.5.1 ESD#4 and later).  By July of 2006, Sybase will remove the third-party ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider from these products.

Benefits of the New Sybase ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider
The new Sybase ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider provide many benefits to ASE users.   Sybase will be able to release patches as well as new feature enhancements much more quickly.  The Sybase ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider are engineered for full, seamless, high-performance support of ASE 12.5.x, 15.0 and future versions.

Getting Support for the Third-Party ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider
Existing customers with valid support contracts who already have the third-party ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider can continue to receive support for these products throughout the life cycle of ASE 12.5.  (Please go to the following URL for its prodcut life cylce information: http://www.sybase.com/products/informationmanagement/adaptiveserverenterprise/lifecycle.) Until July 30, 2007, the support program will continue as it is today.  After July 30, 2007, Sybase will address only P1 (severity level 1) issues.

Please note that the third-party ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider you have today will only support ASE features up to and including ASE 12.5.3.  Any issues found with these drivers will only be addressed by Sybase if they can be reproduced in ASE 12.5.3.  If you use the third-party products with any releases of ASE beyond ASE 12.5.3, Sybase may not be able to identify problems or support fixes.

Migrating to the New Sybase Drivers
Sybase recommends that you update your ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider to the new Sybase ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider as soon as possible.  Specifically, you should migrate:

• When upgrading to ASE 15 or later versions of ASE 12.5.x
• For older versions of ASE, before July 30, 2007

For your convenience during the migration process, the third-party Driver and Provider will support connectivity to the 15.x version of ASE until November 29, 2007, but will not support new features added after ASE 12.5.3.  Patches released after that date will perform a version check, and will not allow connection to ASE 15.x.  This version-check behavior will only be incorporated in patches released after November 30, 2007.  If patches released after November 30, 2007 are not applied, the third-party Driver and Provider can continue to connect to any versions of ASE available in the market.

How to Get Help
To assist you in your migration from third-party to the Sybase ODBC Driver and OLE DB Provider, Sybase offers two guide books:

• "New Features - Open Server 15.0 and SDK 15.0 for Microsoft Windows, Linux, and UNIX"
• "New Features - Open Server 12.5.1 and SDK 12.5.1 for Microsoft Windows, Linux, and UNIX"

Both are available on the Sybase online manual found at http://sybooks.sybase.com/.

Thank you for your continued interest in Sybase products.

Sincerely,

Liti Huang
Product Manager, Adaptive Server Enterprise Connectivity Products
Information Technology & Solutions Group
Sybase, Inc.