San Francisco - Microsoft's business software for creating spreadsheets, documents and presentations is well recognised, but the company is hoping to convince corporations that it also meets all needs for sophisticated communications technology.
At an event on Monday it plans to showcase a variety of planned products designed to narrow the gap between virtually all workers' communications, from email and instant messaging to videoconferencing and traditional telephone calls.
Reply all conference calls
The idea is that a worker could, for example, receive an email and, instead of responding in print, easily set up a conference call with all the recipients. Those people might even see the email subject line on their phones, much like you see caller ID today.
When strung together, the so-called Unified Communications products also are designed to help employees immediately get in contact, whether the person they want to reach is sitting at a computer, driving home or on a business trip.
Microsoft has been working on early iterations of such technology for the past several years, and some, such as Live Communications Server 2005, are already on the market. The new products and updates are due to be out by mid-2007.
Uses modern technology infrastructure
Microsoft's new software relies on technologies such as broadband Internet access and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP). The company also is partnering with companies including cell phone maker Motorola to provide the hardware for the offerings.
Currently, many businesses rely on separate companies for things like traditional phone calls and voice mail, email and instant messaging.
One challenge for Microsoft and other companies seeking to bundle such capabilities is that some of those services, such as instant messaging, are available for free.
One system linking
But Zig Serafin, general manager for Unified Communications at Microsoft, said the software maker is hearing from more companies concerned about the security and reliability of free downloads.
Although he conceded that it could be several years before companies start using some of these advanced technologies, Microsoft's goal is to demonstrate that such technologies can evolve into one linked offering, rather than several separate ones. - Sapa-AP