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Mike Ricciuti has the buzz at CNET:
Microsoft plans to launch a new hosted CRM service under its expanding Live brand next year.Microsoft Dynamics CRM Live, a hosted alternative to its on-premise CRM software, is set to debut by mid-2007 as part of a revamped product code-named Titan.
Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s chief executive, is expected to make the announcement here Tuesday at a conference of roughly 8,000 of its business partners.
The service, the third major category under the Live brand, joining Windows Live and Office Live, underscores Microsoft’s ambitions in the business software market. Company executives have said it could represent Microsoft’s next billion-dollar business.
Actually, I make it the fourth after Xbox Live, but who’s counting? There also already some major players like Salesforce.com, SAP, and Oracle/Siebel in the hosted CRM space as the article notes, so this isn’t going to be a pushover, but it’s yet another indication of the seriousness of Microsoft’s “Live” initiative.
Update: The announcement has taken place and the above article is now slightly different at the original source. Here’s the press release:
Building on the market success of Microsoft Dynamics™ CRM 3.0, Microsoft Corp. today announced the roadmap for the next major release of its Microsoft Dynamics CRM products, including a new software-as-a-service offering called Microsoft Dynamics CRM Live. The Microsoft® CRM Live service will be operated and managed by Microsoft within its Windows Live™ datacenters, and will offer Microsoft’s partners another fast and flexible way to address the unique customer relationship management (CRM) needs of each customer. Microsoft CRM Live will use the same code base as the on-premise and partner-hosted versions of Microsoft CRM, a strategy that reinforces Microsoft’s leadership in allowing customers to choose the best deployment option for their business and IT needs at any time. The full range of Microsoft CRM products is part of Microsoft’s vision for business — the People-Ready Business — and the new Microsoft CRM Live service will be integrated with Microsoft’s Windows Live services and Office Live services.
Microsoft confirmed that Microsoft Dynamics CRM continues to enjoy extremely rapid growth across all segments, geographic regions and industries, and has added more than 50,000 new users in the most recent quarter. The current version of Microsoft CRM is completing its international language rollout, including a May launch in China and a launch this quarter in Japan. At its Worldwide Partner Conference 2006 in Boston today, Microsoft also demonstrated a new open-source client for mobile devices that will be available in August and reconfirmed its plans to release a new Microsoft BizTalk® Server-based integration this quarter that will connect Microsoft CRM to enterprise resource planning (ERP) and CRM applications from other vendors such as Siebel Systems Inc., SAP AG and Oracle Corp.
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Microsoft Dynamics CRM Live is planned for introduction in North America in the second quarter of 2007, and will be offered as a range of service offerings on a monthly subscription basis. There is no limit to the number of users that the system can support, but it will initially be targeted primarily at small businesses, a segment that has traditionally been underserved by the lack of flexible and cost-effective CRM solutions. Early access programs that allow partners to have access to the new Microsoft CRM Live service will begin in the second half of 2006.
There’s lots of interesting grist for the mill there, but it’s still unclear if this is really a new “Live” category or just a one-off. Also, back in March Microsoft announced a hosted version of Dynamics CRM 3.0 to be “deployed by hosting partners around the world”. Now any hosting partners who took them up on it are in competition with this new offering.
As expected, SAP and Microsoft today announced their Mendocino joint project under the name Duet:
Twelve months after first unveiling plans to create “Project Mendocino” — a joint product that enables people to interact quickly and easily with SAP business processes and data through Microsoft® Office applications — SAP AG (NYSE: SAP) and Microsoft Corp. today announced that the two companies are scheduled to ship the product on time in June, 2006. The product is officially named Duet software for Microsoft Office and SAP. Nearly 100 joint customers and industry partners — including Atmel, Infosys, and Kimberly-Clark — have been exploring the software’s benefits in early release versions since late 2005. SAP and Microsoft also announced plans to enhance the capabilities of Duet this year and to release additional business scenarios in the second half of 2006.
Duet allows information workers to use their familiar Microsoft Office environment to access selected SAP business processes and data. This improved and flexible access to dedicated SAP application functionality will help companies who use Duet to save time and money, increase process compliance, and improve decision making.
Each day, millions of information workers use the Microsoft Office system to work and collaborate. However, most of them also must tap into enterprise processes and information in order to do their jobs. Lacking a unified link between a company’s structured business process and accurate information can lead to unsound decision making and non-compliance with company policies. With Duet, companies can increase user adoption of enterprise systems and business processes by offering a familiar environment that is rapidly deployable and requires virtually no training.
Undoubtedly good business for both companies.
Microsoft releases MapPoint 2006:
Microsoft Corp. today announced the availability of MapPoint® 2006, an industry leader in business mapping software. MapPoint 2006 can help customers improve decision-making capabilities and increase new business opportunities through the use of maps and geographical information, enabling better analysis, visualization and communication of business information. It also enhances its usefulness for mobile information workers by adding rich new Global Positioning System (GPS) integration and driver guidance capabilities so that users can make the most out of time spent away from the office. MapPoint 2006 is available today, and comes in two offerings: a stand-alone software package as well as one that includes both the MapPoint 2006 software and a new GPS locator hardware kit.
If you aren’t familiar with it, MapPoint is a standalone mapping application intended for businesses. There’s a Web service version as well. Streets and Trips is its consumer cousin.
Microsoft releases new “software as a service” (SaaS) application hosting solution:
Microsoft Corp. today announced the availability of the Microsoft® Solution for Windows®-based Hosting for Applications Version 1.0. The new solution provides independent software vendors (ISVs) and hosting service providers with the platform, tools and best practices to deliver software as a service, an area in which leading IT market research and advisory firm IDC estimates spending will reach $10.7 billion (U.S.) worldwide by 2009.
One of the little publicized Microsoft hosting solutions. Admittedly, it’s a specialized market.
Beta 1 of Virtual Server 2005 R2 service pack 1 released:
Beta 1 of Virtual Server 2005 R2 service pack 1 includes:Intel Virtualization Technology compatibility Host Clustering technical white paper and the VB script Beta 2 includes the features of Beta 1 plus:
AMD Virtualization compatibility Active Directory integration and management features Volume Shadow Service (VSS) Expanded guest and host OS support
Download Beta 1 here. Beta 2 is planned for Q4 and final release in 1Q2007.
‘Mendicino’ Version 1.0 Ready to Roll. Mary Jo Foley reports that Mendocino, the SAP/Microsoft joint project linking Office to the SAP back-end will be announced tomorrow.
Windows Live ID has been rolled out in place of Passport for the Windows Live sites. Passport login information still works, of course. More details here.
SQL Server 2005 was just launched last November, but Service Pack 1 (SP1) was released today. It’s less about buf fixes than added features though:
SP1 delivers production-ready Database Mirroring functionality for continuous availability. This complements the existing Always On Technologies in SQL Server 2005 such as failover clustering, database snapshots, snapshot isolation and log shipping. Since launch, Database Mirroring has been extensively tested by Microsoft and its thriving customer community to help ensure that it provides the high availability necessary for the largest customer deployments. Today more than 20 SQL Server customers have deployed Database Mirroring into production.
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SP1 extends business insight to smaller-scale customers and ISVs using the free SQL Server 2005 Express Edition, which includes SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) functionality, Full Text Search and the newly released SQL Server Management Studio Express. This optional set of capabilities is already receiving positive feedback from Microsoft’s ISV partners.
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SP1 also advances dynamic applications with the new SQL Server Management Studio Express, a simplified graphical management environment for SQL Server Express Edition.
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For end-to-end business insight, SP1 extends SSRS to support enterprise reporting on SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence with two new components in SP1: a Microsoft .NET Data provider for SAP NetWeaver Business Intelligence and a new MDX Query Designer. This new functionality extends the benefits of enterprise reporting with SQL Server by enabling SAP customers to easily create and manage reports on information inside any SAP BW data warehouse.
