Global Businesses Choosing Lotus Software; More Than Half of Fortune Global 100 Now Using Lotus Notes/Domino

ARMONK, NY - In advance of its annual Lotusphere conference in Orlando, Florida next week, IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced that the number of global Lotus Notes licenses has reached 145 million, up five million, including purchases by many industry leaders exchanging Microsoft licenses for Lotus collaboration software.

Over the past 15 months ending in the third quarter of 2008, more than 12,000 new organizations bought their first Notes/Domino licenses, and more than half of the Fortune global 100 now use Lotus Notes and Domino. This includes more than 80 percent of the largest banks, consumer product, electronics, insurance, pharmaceutical and telecommunications companies -- as well as more than 50 percent of America’s largest 100 companies.

“The shift from pre-Web, proprietary technology to open software that helps people connect, collaborate and innovate at a reasonable cost is undeniable,” said Bob Picciano, general manager, IBM Lotus Software. “There’s no turning back -- even our largest competitor is trying to wrap itself in the open standards flag we’ve been flying for years.”

Driven by sales of Notes and Domino, IBM has reported consecutive quarterly growth for its Lotus collaboration software brand for four years through the third quarter of 2008, its last reported quarter, with much of it coming at Microsoft’s expense. Lotus has averaged double-digit growth over the first three quarters of 2008. While marketshare estimates vary, Gartner Dataquest’s most recent report from 2008 indicates a 40 percent share worldwide for Lotus Notes, compared to Microsoft’s 48 percent for Exchange, a narrowing gap.

A number of customers that Microsoft had previously announced would migrate to Exchange are now stalling or abandoning those plans. These organizations recognize the higher cost of potential migration to the competing product and the benefits of deploying Notes/Domino 8 through 8.5 versions. In some cases, the cost of upgrading Notes/Domino has shown to be 20 percent or less of what companies were projecting for migration costs to Exchange.

IBM has won many new Lotus Notes customers, the biggest increase since the release of Notes Domino 8.0 in August 2007, and has benefitted from renewed commitments from existing customers. Recent Lotus Notes decisions include The Coca-Cola Company, Nationwide, Linde Group, Global Hyatt Corp., CEMEX, The Hartford, Banco do Brazil, Banca Intesa Sanpaolo and Petrobas, among others.

In addition, a number of customers worldwide have chosen to standardize on Lotus Notes over Microsoft Exchange, as well as migrate their existing Exchange environments to the latest versions of Notes/Domino 8. They include Minolta, Toshiba, Continental AG, EVONIK, Caja Espana, Bank of New York Mellon, Kendle, Kohl’s, Constructora San Jose, Banco do Brazil, Banco Antonveneta, Hitachi, Freightliner, Manulife, Sherwin Williams, Belden Wire, Ministry Of Finance Belgium, John Hancock, Ton Yang, Air France, Danone, SunTel, INEOS, Werner Enterprises and Payflex.

In recent engagements, IBM has been helping customers improve their messaging economics through enhancements in performance and scalability, “green” initiatives, and the optional ability for IBM to provide off-premise solutions through software as a service (SaaS) and cloud services. In one recent customer engagement, IBM’s assessment of existing messaging economics is helping reduce a company’s operational costs by 23 percent over 12 months. The customer projects an additional $27 million in savings with the use of Lotus Symphony instead of Microsoft Office.

Economics are only one part of the equation, especially when evaluating software delivery models. Several customers have shown that using some of the new capabilities in Lotus Notes 8.5 on-premise can save significant costs over other offerings such as Microsoft Online Services. In addition, Domino 8.5 has proven to reduce storage and related costs by up to 40 percent, while increasing reliability and flexibility.

Other popular capabilities driving client interest include social computing features such as integration with the Lotus Connections enterprise social networking technology -- for which Microsoft has no alternative -- and the personal and business calendar matching of the newest Notes release, 8.5. In addition, younger, more Web-oriented professionals are adopting Notes for its connectivity with the Apple Macintosh; appealing interface that integrates key work tools on one screen; and Web 2.0 features, including composite applications, widgets and fully integrated unified communications.

For more information, visit www.ibm.com/lotus