Existing Java applets, developed with the Sun JDK 1.0 are automatically exposed as ActiveX™ Controls by the Microsoft Java VM. ActiveX™ Controls is just a new name for OLE Controls. One implication of this is that any Java applet can now be plopped onto any application which supports ActiveX(tm) Controls, including Visual Basic, Access, Delphi, and Power Builder.
The fact that Java supports the creation of "thread-safe" objects, and because COM allows "thread-safe" objects to be executed remotely in very efficient manner makes Java an awesome tool for creating server applications.