Big Blue is hoping to add to its presence in the office space, and beef up sales of its Lotus division, by offering desktop productivity applications from a server, distributed to a variety of devices.
Improvements to Lotus Workspace Messaging (LWM), Lotus Workplace Documents (LWD) and Workplace Client Technology, Micro Edition (WCTME) are three new
applications that IBM hopes will help it chip away at the dominance enjoyed in the space by Microsoft
.
By running applications through the server, rather than at the desktop, the software updates give customers the ability to access their applications via the Web or corporate intranet using not only their desktop or laptop but PDAs
By putting all the software on the server, IBM is hoping business users won’t have to deal with accessing documents from a particular Web application or client-based software piece; it will all reside under one unified application model, accessible by most kinds of devices.
With WCTME 5.7 and a beefed up Workplace Messaging app, Lotus mobile users can
go online and send instant messages (IM) or download their email, get updates on
their collaborative projects, get the latest sales figures and view them offline
at leisure. Since documents, presentations and reports are centrally managed,
collaborative projects are more logically placed, officials said.
Workplace Messaging is an update to the software debuted in May 2003, which
featured a baseline e-mail management
component.
IBM will tap its middleware WebSphere portal software to provide the front-end
interface for these server-based applications and Tivoli to manage the accounts
on the network. WCTME 5.7 support allows for ‘mini’ support of DB2e, Java
runtime environments, Service Management Framework and MQe integration on thin
clients like PDAs. And unlike Microsoft, IBM’s software will run on
Windows, Unix, Linux and mobile operating systems (OS) like Symbian. Support
for Apple is expected later this year.
The new software comes with support for application developed by IBM partners
like Adobe and PeopleSoft.
Lotus has been quickly morphing into an Office-killer since last year, adding
capabilities that merge back-office management with front-end end user
productivity tools like the integrated email, calendar and IM functions tool
that were released as part of a larger update in
November 2003.
Because it’s built on top of J2EE
source developers and applications not enjoyed by Microsoft and its proprietary
software.
Officials at Big Blue surely expect big things from the Lotus upgrade. Sales of
the collaboration software have been
modest, at best, compared to other IBM middleware offerings. In the fourth
quarter of 2003, Lotus sales gained a two percent boost compared to 17 and 10
percent gains in Tivoli and WebSphere sales, respectively.
Analysts see the move by IBM more as a shift to offering software in a more
dynamic, distributed computing environment.
