"Throughout 2007, IBM has delivered on its promise to take customers beyond e-mail with advanced collaboration capabilities that address the needs of today's connected workplace," said Mike Rhodin, IBM Lotus Software general manager. "IBM is changing the game for customers competing in a Web 2.0 world, with a clearly defined product line to help them transform their business processes."

The collaboration suite includes:

Applications on Demand for Lotus Notes, which makes Lotus Notes 8 available as a service with enterprise-level application hosting. It gives customers a hosted and managed environment for mail and collaborative applications. By delegating the management of mail and collaboration applications, this service can help customers integrate their e-mail solutions. Customers pay as they go for what they need, so they can reduce up-front project and infrastructure costs. Applications on Demand for Lotus Notes support Lotus Sametime and Lotus Quickr, and IBM plans to extend it to other Lotus collaboration products.

IBM Lotus Notes Traveler is a new client for Lotus Notes and Domino 8.0.1, and will provide mobile support for Lotus Notes and Domino Web Access. It will give users access to Lotus Domino mail from Microsoft Windows Mobile devices. IBM plans to have Lotus Notes Traveler provide automatic, real-time e-mail replication, including attachments, calendar, address book, journal, and to-do's, and it will work over all wired and wireless connections. Lotus Notes Traveler is scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2008.

Web 2.0 features in Lotus Domino Web Access 8.0.1 and 64-bit support in Lotus Domino 8.0.1. This version of Lotus Domino Web Access includes a Web 2.0 interface that provides optimized access for users connecting to their Lotus Domino servers over a low speed connection such as dial-up. Lotus Domino 8.0.1 will introduce native 64-bit support for Microsoft Windows and AIX platforms, designed to reduce e-mail and application storage costs through increased data compression, and adds support for FIPS 140-2 standard support to enable secure Notes e-mail.

Extend Lotus Quickr to more users and content sources via Lotus Notes 8 and Microsoft Outlook connectors, additional APIs, and Lotus Quickr Content Integrator. New Quickr connectors for Lotus Notes 8 and Microsoft Outlook are planned for the first quarter of 2008. With them, team members can save attachments to team workspaces; replace attachments with shared links; and use the collaborative content services of Lotus Quickr directly in Lotus Notes and Microsoft Outlook without having to hop between applications. Users will be able to drag-and-drop their Lotus Notes and Outlook attachments into Quickr folders, reducing the size of their mail files, ensure they always have access to the latest document version, and get new team members up to speed quickly. The new Lotus Quickr APIs IBM plans to release will allow integration with enterprise content management systems, including IBM FileNet P8 and IBM Content Manager, setting the stage for comprehensive content management coupled with the intuitive user interface and collaborative strength of Lotus Quickr.

Lotus Quickr Content Integrator is a new companion product to Quickr, scheduled for release during the first quarter of 2008. Administrators can use it to import content from Lotus Domino Document Manager libraries, Lotus Domino teamrooms, Microsoft Outlook public folders, and Microsoft SharePoint sites into Lotus Quickr services for Domino (NSF repositories).

Lotus Forms 3 uses open-standards technology to help customers integrate data across the enterprise and with existing IT systems. With it, organizations can extend business processes outside the firewall by offering their customers the ability to create, fill out, sign, and submit forms data via a Web browser without downloading additional software. By integrating directly with web services, Lotus Forms delivers a scalable solution with a user interface that integrates to service-oriented architectures, and helps streamline process automation, improve efficiencies, and reduce costs of operation.

New WebSphere Portal purchasing options have three new business packages that include tools from Lotus Quickr, Lotus Connections, and WebSphere Web Content Management. The WebSphere Portal accelerators help organizations add key features to their WebSphere Portal. For example, with tools from WebSphere Web Content Management in the Content Accelerator, customers can build and manage Web sites, intranets, extranets, and portals. Users can create content using intuitive Web tools, then deliver it with personalization to site visitors. With the Collaboration Accelerator, users can access team workspaces, document libraries, presence awareness and Lotus Sametime, Web conferencing, people profiles and directories, as well as enterprise social networking features such as blogs, wikis, shared bookmarking, and communities. The Enterprise Suite is a comprehensive package that includes Web content management, collaboration, electronic forms, dashboards, advanced search, and offline rich client support.

In 2007, IBM has upgraded every product area in its collaboration portfolio, including Web 2.0 features in Lotus Notes and Domino 8; professional networking tools for the enterprise with IBM Lotus Connections; document sharing through IBM Lotus Quickr; rich, browser-based Web 2.0 electronic forms with IBM Lotus Forms; expanded unified communications and instant messaging in IBM Lotus Sametime 8; and enterprise mashup capabilities in IBM WebSphere Portal.