In this whitepaper, we will make a powerful comparison between the two choices that businesses have for building XML-based web services: the Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE), built by Sun Microsystems and other industry players, and Microsoft.NET 2 , built by Microsoft Corporation. After reading this white paper, you will have a solid understanding of how these architectures compare, and be empowered to make intelligent decisions in new web services initiatives.