New Family of Lotus Products To Deliver Innovative ‘Sametime’ Collaboration Benefits To Business
DataBeam and Ubique Form Centerpieces of Real-Time Collaboration Solutions
CAMBRIDGE, Mass (May 19, 1998) –
Lotus Development Corp. today announced plans to offer client- and server-based products that deliver the benefits of network-based, real-time communication and collaboration to businesses worldwide. Lotus will leverage the document-based awareness, instant messaging, and real-time conferencing capabilities of Israel-based Ubique Ltd. and Lexington, Ky.-based DataBeam Corp., as well as the leading-edge collaboration capabilities of Lotus Notes and Domino, to expand the benefits of groupware into a comprehensive Sametime collaboration platform.
“Lotus’ unrivaled knowledge of how people and organizations work collaboratively to achieve success uniquely positions us to lead the industry’s next wave of solutions,” said Eileen Rudden, senior vice president of Lotus’ Communications Products Division. “Sametime will change the way businesses leverage online interaction throughout their organizations. As the pace of business has increased, companies have begun to realize that their professionals need the ability to find colleagues online, rapidly conduct meetings, and share and exchange information and applications in real-time — regardless of geographic boundaries. Lotus’ plans for Sametime products, bolstered by the acquisitions of Ubique and DataBeam, are designed to address those needs.”
Lotus’ Sametime Offerings: Real-Time Collaboration That’s Fit For Business
During the past decade, Lotus has been the leader in messaging and business collaboration, with more than 36 million messaging and groupware users. Through its Sametime product strategy, Lotus will spur a significant leap in the value of collaborative computing solutions. These products will deliver functions that include tools for awareness of online colleagues, a range of real-time conversation types, and the ability to share, co-author and edit objects, documents or Web pages.
Lotus will augment the products and technologies of DataBeam and Ubique with the capabilities of Notes and Domino. The result will be a highly secure solution that gives users a natural transition between asynchronous and synchronous collaboration, and a platform that allows developers to fold these Sametime technologies into their Notes and Domino applications, or leverage them with their other product investments.
DataBeam and Ubique: Leaders in Real-Time Communications Technology
The Ubique and DataBeam acquisitions provide Lotus with industry-leading technology on which the Sametime product family will be based. In addition to offering the scalable text-based chat, instant messaging and onlinecolleague listsalready in use by millions of users today, Ubique has pioneered document-based awareness technology, which allows users to see colleagues who are working online with the same document.DataBeam provides standards-based, open-protocol support for real-time data, as well as audio and video conferencing applications — such as application sharing and white-boarding collaboration. Both companies offer the most scalable and reliable server-based, real-time collaboration technology in their categories.
Lotus will support International Telecommunications Union (ITU) standards for data conferencing (T.120), audio and video conferencing (H.323), and will actively participate in Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standards-setting processes for online presence and awareness. Lotus’ Sametime products will offer standards-based compatibility and interoperability with other real-time products, such as Microsoft NetMeeting, as well as networking and audio products and services coming to market from telecommunications and IP telephony companies.
Ubique’s technology further strengthens Lotus’ partnership with America Online, Inc. (AOL) to make the AOL Instant Messenger service available to Notes users. Lotus and AOL announced in November that future versions of Notes would include support for the AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) service. Lotus will ensure that the instant messaging capabilities implemented in Lotus Notes will interoperate with the AIM service. This capability will allow the over 22 million Notes users to communicate privately, one-on-one, in real-time with the more than 20 million users of the AOL Buddy List network.
Lotus’ Sametime Products To Complement Existing Lotus and Industry Offerings
Through the acquisition of proven and extensible technologies, Lotus will deliver Sametime solutions that are compatible not only with Notes and Domino but with products from other vendors, as well. The Sametime family will consist of several elements that address the required functions of awareness, conversation and shared objects:
* Client Solutions: The Lotus Notes client will be extended to provide awareness information on active databases or documents. Notes also will include real-time conferencing capabilities, enabling users to share documents, in real time, with any other T.120-based conferencing client. Additionally, Lotus’ Sametime family will provide standards-based real-time Java and ActiveX components, which allow users with Web browsers to participate in real-time conferences and Notes users to Sametime-enable their Notes applications.
* Server Solutions: Lotus will combine the capabilities of Domino and the two companies’ leading collaborative servers into one real-time server offering. The Sametime server will support awareness, instant messaging, application sharing, collaborative browsing, white-boarding and other real-time services for Notes clients, browsers, as well as Microsoft’s NetMeeting clients or any other T.120- or H.323-based clients.
* Distance Learning Solutions: DataBeam’s Learning server components and applications will be combined with the updated Sametime server into an updated Sametime learning solution. Lotus is enhancing its LearningSpace product for compatibility with the Sametime learning solution to offer substantial benefits for customers as a complete platform for anytime, online learning.
* Application Development Tools: Lotus will provide C/C++ and Java APIs and associated class libraries, as well as a full set of Java and Active/X components for Awareness, Conversation, and Shared Object services. In addition, Sametime-enabled templates will allow Lotus Business Partners, ISVs and corporate developers to build Sametime services and solutions into new and existing applications.
* Services: Lotus’ Consulting, Support and Customer Education organizations will incorporate Sametime products into their offerings.
Through the blending of synchronous and asynchronous communication capabilities provided by Lotus’ Sametime solutions, organizations can achieve more productive collaboration, and promote quicker response time, foster team-building, and make communication richer and more efficient. Business applications enhanced by Sametime include corporate communications, customer service, sales force automation, e-commerce, corporate training and education and many others.
Pricing and Availability
Lotus will deliver the first of its Sametime solutions later this year. Additional Sametime product details, pricing and availability will be announced at a later date. Current product offerings from DataBeam and Ubique will be available through existing sales channels.
Lotus Development Corporation, founded in 1982, is a subsidiary of IBM Corporation. Lotus offers high-quality software products and services that reflect the company’s unique understanding of the new ways in which individuals and businesses must work together to achieve success. Lotus’ innovative approach is evident in a new class of applications that allows users to access and communicate information in ways never before possible, both within and beyond organizational boundaries. Lotus now markets its products in more than 80 countries worldwide and provides numerous professional consulting, support and education services through the Lotus Services Group.
Source: IBM