The middleware software market continues to mature — from the bottom of the technology stack to the higher layers. A set of 15 representative vendors announced a healthy mix of new product innovations and the maintenance of existing products with successive releases. Forrester tracked 259 different activities in the middleware market across three core categories of mergers and acquisitions (M&A), partnerships, and product-related announcements. While the large vendors followed a mixed M&A and partnership strategy, mid-range vendors — those with around $1 billion in revenues — seemed to focus on either partnerships or M&A activity for their growth in H1 2008.