IBM Unveils Next Generation Collaboration Software Suite
IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced an expansion of its collaboration software portfolio, introducing new products and features to help customers improve productivity, business networking and knowledge sharing. The announcements were made at IBM’s Collaboration Summit in New York City.
In the past year, IBM has upgraded every product area in its collaboration portfolio, including Web 2.0 features in Lotus Notes and Domino 8; professional networking tools for the enterprise
with IBM Lotus Connections; easy document sharing through IBM Lotus Quickr; rich, browser-based Web 2.0 electronic forms with IBM Lotus Forms; expanded unified communications and instant messaging in IBM Lotus Sametime 8.0; and enterprise mashup capabilities in IBM WebSphere Portal.
New additions to the portfolio include tools to help users move to the next level of integrated communications. This helps them track information, easily locate subject matter experts, form project teams, and allocate skills where they are needed. Users can also easily create, share and process electronic forms directly from the Web as well as replicate Lotus Notes and Domino content from a mobile device.
“Throughout 2007, IBM has delivered on its promise to take customers beyond email with advanced collaboration capabilities that address the needs of today’s connected workplace,” said Mike Rhodin, general manager, IBM Lotus Software. “IBM is changing the game for customers competing in a Web 2.0 world, with a clearly defined product line to help them transform their business processes.”
IBM’s collaboration suite includes the following tools, offerings and upgrades:
Applications on Demand for Lotus Notes - making Lotus Notes 8 available as a service with enterprise level application hosting. Available now, IBM’s Applications on Demand service provides customers with the benefits of the Lotus suite without having to invest in computing assets or skills. This new offering provides Lotus collaboration customers with a hosted and managed environment for their mail and collaborative applications, helping improve the performance of their messaging environments while enhancing efficiencies and productivity. By delegating the complex management of mail and collaboration applications, Applications on Demand for Lotus Notes can help clients tackle the integration of their entire email solutions. This includes not just email, but ever-expanding collaboration capabilities all within a security-rich, advanced hosting environment. Since clients pay as they go for what they need, they are able to reduce up-front project and infrastructure costs, speeding returns on investment. Applications on Demand for Lotus Notes currently support Lotus Sametime and Lotus Quickr, and will be extended to other Lotus collaboration products over time.
Mobile support for Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access users through IBM Lotus Notes Traveler- Following the shipping of Lotus Notes and Domino 8 that began worldwide in August, IBM is announcing Lotus Notes Traveler, a new client for Lotus Notes and Domino 8.0.1. Currently scheduled to be available in the first quarter of 2008, Lotus Notes Traveler will provide out-of-the-box, mobile support for Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access users, enabling access to Lotus Domino mail from Microsoft Windows Mobile devices. As currently planned, Lotus Notes Traveler will provide automatic, real-time replication of email, including attachments, calendar, address book, journal and to-do’s and will work over all wired and wireless connections.
Web 2.0 features in Lotus Domino Web Access 8.0.1 and 64-bit support in Lotus Domino 8.0.1– This light view of Lotus Domino Web Access includes a new Web 2.0-based interface that provides optimized access for users connecting to their Lotus Domino servers over a low speed connection such as dial-up. Lotus Domino 8.0.1 will introduce native 64-bit support for Microsoft Windows and AIX platforms, dramatically reduce email and application storage costs through increased data compression, and adds support for FIPS 140-2 standard support to enable secure Notes email.
Extended reach of Lotus Quickr to more users and content sources through Lotus Notes 8 and Microsoft Outlook connectors, additional APIs and Lotus Quickr Content Integrator - New Quickr connectors for Lotus Notes 8 and Microsoft Outlook are currently planned to be available in the first quarter of 2008. They will allow team members to save attachments into team workspaces; replace attachments with shared links; and use the collaborative content services of Lotus Quickr directly in Lotus Notes and Microsoft Outlook without having to hop between applications. With drag and drop support, the Lotus Quickr connectors for Lotus Notes and Outlook will make it easy to move attachments directly into Quickr folders, enabling users to reduce the size of their mail files, ensure they always have access to the latest document version and get new team members up to speed quickly. New planned Lotus Quickr APIs will allow integration with enterprise content management systems, including IBM FileNet P8 and IBM Content Manager, setting the stage for comprehensive content management coupled with the intuitive user interface and collaborative strength of Lotus Quickr.
Also currently planned for availability in the first quarter of 2008 is Lotus Quickr Content Integrator, a new companion product to Quickr for the mass movement of documents from server to server. -- Administrators can use Lotus Quickr Content Integrator to import content from Lotus Domino Document Manager libraries, Lotus Domino teamrooms, Microsoft Outlook public folders, and Microsoft SharePoint sites into Lotus Quickr services for Domino (NSF repositories). The price for Lotus Quickr Content Integrator will be released at product availability.
Browser-based electronic forms with Lotus Forms 3.0 – This major upgrade to IBM’s electronic forms product uses open-standards based technology to make it easy for customers to integrate data across the enterprise and with existing IT systems. Customers can now extend business processes outside the firewall by offering their customers the ability to create, fill out, sign and submit forms data via a web browser without downloading additional software. By integrating directly with Web Services, Lotus Forms delivers a scalable solution with a user interface that tightly integrates to Service Oriented Architectures, and helps to streamline process automation, improve efficiencies and reduce costs of operation.
Simplified WebSphere Portal purchasing with three new business packages that include tools from Lotus Quickr, Lotus Connections and WebSphere Web Content Management – The new accelerators give organizations easy to integrate packages for WebSphere Portal so they can add key features as needed. With tools from WebSphere Web Content Management provided in the Content Accelerator, customers can build and manage web sites, intranets, extranets, and portals. Content can be easily created using intuitive, web-based tools and then delivered with a high level of personalization to site visitors. Using the Collaboration Accelerator, users get access to the following: team workspaces, document libraries, presence awareness and Lotus Sametime, web conferencing, people profiles and directories, as well as enterprise social networking features such as blogs, wikis, shared bookmarking and communities. The Enterprise Suite is a comprehensive package that includes Web content management, collaboration, electronic forms, dashboards, advanced search and offline rich client support.
Pricing and availability:
Applications on Demand for Lotus Notes is available now. More information is at: http://www.ibm.com/services/aod
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