Can IBM Take On Google, Microsoft With iNotes?

CWmike writes to mention that IBM has launched LotusLive iNotes, a system designed to compete with GMail and Exchange that offers email, calendaring, and contact management. "Pricing starts at $3 per user per month, undercutting Google Apps Premier Edition, which costs $50 per user per year. IBM is aiming the software at large enterprises that want to migrate an on-premise e-mail system to SaaS (software as a service), particularly for users who aren't tied to a desk, such as retail workers. It is also hoping to win business from smaller companies interested in on-demand software but with concerns about security and service outages, such as those suffered by Gmail in recent months. LotusLive iNotes is based on technology IBM purchased from the Hong Kong company Outblaze."

Re:If LotusLive iNotes is in any way based on

[digitalunity]

Lotus Notes takes a very interesting approach to generic databases. I laud Lotus for their design philosophy and I know IBM has put a lot of work into it, but the implementation of Lotus Notes leaves a lot to be desired. Making all documents generic databases wasn't a bad idea.

This iNotes seems to be a subset of Lotus Notes functionality based on an all-new codebase. Probably a good thing.

It's about Local Control

[Arainach]

This will not take over the role of Exchange for the same reason Google won't take over the role of Exchance - for a lot of companies, having local control of their data and communications is key. Storing confidential data in the "cloud" (how I hate that term) is a security and privacy risk and a potential source of liability. Thanks to this, there will always be a demand for locally-run and locally-administered mail servers, and nothing really competes with Exchange in that realm.

Reminds me of a certain Redmond Company...

[jkyrlach]

Lotus Notes makes it clear where MS got their evil genes from. Because Lotus notes was released as both email client and MS Access equivalent, companies that adopteded it have found themselves hopelessly locked in. In the spirit of "getting things done" my company has allowed its users to create thousands of apps in our Notes system, making it impossible to ever switch to anything else. IBM has nice reliable income, and employees everywhere suffer.

Haha, Have you ever used lotus notes?

[EZ Erik]

My company is an IBM partner, and for political reasons we try to use lotus notes, or like we call it lotus jokes. The thing is the most un-user friendly piece of software I have ever used. Email addresses are stored like directory structures that make no sense. The calendar does not integrate with other meeting requests I get. The list goes on and on. Could be just how my company implemented it but man it sucks to use. Its not even close to google apps like gmail. or outlook and exchange, feels about 10 years behind its competitors.

Re:Costs Less, But...

[Anonymous Coward]

For $36/head you get 1gig of data storage vs. Google at $50/head gets you 25gig of storage. I have no idea how Notes has survived as long as it has. Crap hardly begins to either the notes client or server.

Plus you don't get Docs, Sites, Video, Moderator, and -coming soon- Groups and Wave.

Google Apps Premier isn't just email and calendaring, it is a suite of several productivity applications with more added all the time. Yeah, iNotes looks like pure fail to me.

How can you fail to predict a market IN THE PAST?

[CFD339]

Here's something to think about, to all of you declaring that Notes is crap.

The real enterprise class messaging world is split about in half between using Microsoft Exchange on the back end and using Lotus Domino on the back end. Different analysts will split it in different places, and different parts of the world will also vary the numbers a bit, but generally the market for enterprise messaging is about split in half with everyone else taking up a very small percentage.

So, the product that you're calling "absolute crap" seems to be one of the few in the software industry holding its own against a relentless Microsoft push for years on end. Why is that? The answer is because it is VERY good at doing what it does -- which is providing a messaging platform that is manageable and secure across really large enterprises with tens or hundreds of thousands of users.

Lots of products are better than Notes or Domino at one or two things, but no product has the breadth and scope of its features in an enterprise manageable application server. The closest thing to it would be an entire linux distro, with various packages performing roles similar to the tasks on a Domino server. It's not a great match up but it's a hell of a lot closer than comparing it to "Gmail" which is pretty good for EMAIL or to Exchange. Maybe if you compared it to Exchange + Outlook + Sharepoint + SQL Server + Office + Visual Studio. That's a fairly expensive comparison and totally unmanageable to deploy across tens of thousands of users.

What amazes me are the predictions of failure. Hello? It already succeeded! It makes a TON of money and keeps a LOT of people employed. I can certainly understand if you don't LIKE the product. There are things that are long overdue to be overhauled, for sure. Predicting the failure of something that has already succeeded though -- that's fairly moronic.

As someone pointed out, however, LotusLive iNotes is not Notes, not Domino based iNotes (which has won awards, by the way, for its user interface), but is in fact an entirely different platform specifically built to be a hosted mail environment that has nothing to do with the old Lotus Notes or the Domino server. So far, I don't recommend it.
 

Re:It's also racist

[PopeRatzo]

The only person I ever knew through work who committed suicide was a Lotus Notes administrator. Maybe it was just coincidental, but I'm just sayin'...

It's a sad but true story..