| By Rafael Laguna |
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| October 5, 2009 06:15 PM EDT |
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1,362 |
Reuters published an article titled "IBM takes on Google in business Web-mail market" - bold words but hey, this is Big Blue, right? We haven't seen much from IBM in the SaaS space yet, so this move was about time. What is surprising is the positioning of this offering, low function, low price ($36/user/year) but business Web-Mail. This simple Web-Mail offering is not based on Notes but on Outblaze, a more consumer oriented Web-Mail client from a company from Hong Kong that IBM bought cheaply earlier this year.
To compete in the business mail space IBM needs to do more than this. Real business email offerings like Network Solutions nsMail Pro or 1&1 MailXchange offer fully featured messaging and groupware, with push mobility, Outlook and Mac integration, a fully featured Web client and much more.
The only thing about "LotusLive iNotes" in common with Lotus Notes is the brand name. It is not from Lotus, not Notes, not business eMail, and it will not make the smallest dent in Googles business.
Rafael Laguna is Chief Executive Officer of Open-Xchange Inc., of which he was co-founder and chairman of the board until he took over responsibility as CEO in January 2008. In 2001, Laguna initiated the technology partnership between Open-Xchange's development team and SUSE Linux - today a Novell business. The result of this partnership, SUSE Linux Openexchange Server, became the best selling Linux-based groupware solution. Most recently, Laguna was crucial to the extention of Open-Xchange's product portfolio and formed the partnership with the world’s largest web host by known servers, 1&1 Internet AG.
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