Microsoft Aims At Integrated Communications

Application is designed to enable people to control phones, IM, E-mail, and conferencing from within Office

Paul Travis, Managing Editor, InformationWeek.com

October 22, 2004

1 Min Read
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Microsoft plans to introduce early next year an upgraded integrated-communications client that provides real-time collaboration capabilities by combining instant messaging, presence, audio- and videoconferencing, telephony, and application, data, and file sharing. The client, known as Istanbul, is designed to work with a new version of Microsoft's Live Communications Server, which will be released in a few weeks. The communications and collaboration system can serve up to 100,000 users.

The software lets PC users control just about every type of communication with a few mouse clicks, rerouting or forwarding phone calls from an office phone to a mobile phone to a home phone, or quickly setting up audio- and videoconferences and IM chats. The client will be integrated with Microsoft Office applications so people can use the communications and collaborations capabilities without having to switch to another application. It also will work with PBX voice systems from many vendors and a variety of conferencing services.

The client "sounds very promising," says Genelle Hung, senior analyst with the Radicati Group, a research firm. The combination of instant messaging, telephony, presence, and Web conferencing is "really what information workers and power users will most likely need and want to use."

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About the Author

Paul Travis

Managing Editor, InformationWeek.com

Paul Travis is Managing Editor of InformationWeek.com. Paul got his start as a newspaper reporter, putting black smudges on dead trees in the 1970s. Eventually he moved into the digital world, covering the telecommunications industry in the 1980s (when Ma Bell was broken up) and moving to writing and editing stories about computers and information technology in the 1990s (when he became a "content creator"). He was a news editor for InformationWeek magazine for more than a decade, and he also served as executive editor for Tele.Com, and editor of Byte and Switch, a storage-focused website. Once he realized this Internet thingy might catch on, he moved to the InformationWeek website, where he oversees a team of reporters that cover breaking technology news throughout the day.

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