In general, CEP software looks for patterns and correlations in the ocean of electronic transactions or "events" that occur each day in a business, and triggers responsive actions depending on what is found. For example, the technology could be used by a large online commerce or banking site to spot suspicious activity or make ultra-fast trades in response to certain conditions.

Not many companies are involved in CEP right now. Among large platform vendors, the main player is IBM, which bought a company called AptSoft last year for its CEP tools. Other products include Progress Software's Apama.

After the merger, Aleri will have about 80 customers and will be retaining virtually all of Coral8's employees, said Aleri CEO Don DeLoach. Coral8's CEO, Terry Cunningham, is serving as chairman of the company's board.

The deal made sense due to the companies' complementary product sets and respective market targets, DeLoach said.

Coral8 has "done a marvelous job in appealing to developers," with features such as a SQL-like , and also has had "a keen eye on distribution channels," not being specific to one market, he said.