IBM upgrades Lotus Connections software

BANGALORE, INDIA: IBM, today announced an expanded set of social software tools and capabilities for enterprise collaboration that brings popular features like micro-blogging from the home into the business environment.

Leading companies such as NEC Electronics (Europe) GmbH and Sogeti are among the early adopters of IBM's collaboration platform, Lotus Connections 2.5, said a press release.

Realizing the benefits of Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0, IBM is bringing a comprehensive social software platform to businesses with the debut of Lotus Connections 2.5.

“With Lotus Connections, we have merged document sharing and social networking capabilities to create a comprehensive collaboration platform for businesses,” said Karthik Padmanabhan – country manager – Lotus – Software Group – IBM India/South Asia.

Lotus Connections, which originated at IBM Research, is an example of the types of technologies that result from the center for social software's incubator for innovative technologies.

The new release of Lotus Connections expands on IBM's commitment to bringing a business-grade social software platform to the market. With the extranet, Internet and intranet collaboration services provided by IBM and IBM customers, Lotus Connections enables tens of millions of users worldwide to connect and collaborate, said the release.

The latest version of Lotus Connections provides a new, Web-based file sharing library for users to easily upload and securely share content such as presentations and documents. Utilizing social software features such as tagging, ratings, recommendations, and the ability to comment, the solution offers an effective way for colleagues to share, view and provide feedback on content.

New integrated mobile support for iPhone and Nokia S60 devices allows access to the Lotus Connections profiles, activities and blog services. Now professionals that travel frequently or work remotely can update their status and locate people in their profiles directly from mobile devices.

Additionally, the new Lotus Connections release offers a number of enhancements to existing services including home page, blogs, bookmarks and activities offered in the previous version of the platform.

Since Lotus Connections is based on industry standards, it offers integration with Microsoft SharePoint. This integration allows users to perform Lotus Connections Profile searches from within Microsoft SharePoint, integrate Lotus Connections Business cards within Microsoft SharePoint and provides access to a Lotus Connections tag cloud Web part for use in Microsoft SharePoint, added the release.