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Chatter: In chat with Chuck Ganapathi

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CIOL Bureau
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BANGALORE, INDIA: As the CRM services major Salesforce.com spruces itself up for the next phase of cloud computing, let's hear it from Chuck Ganapathi, senior vice president, products, Salesforce.com about their Chatter application, said to be their stepping stone to the 'Cloud 2' era. Excerpts:

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CIOL: What is Salesforce's Chatter Cloud?

Chuck: Chatter is a collaboration platform that we announced in June 2009. This is the next generation of cloud computing, that epitomizes what we call as Cloud 2.

Also Read: Salesforce offers chatter networking on mobile

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Cloud 1 was about shared infrastructure, massive scale, elasticity, low cost etc. However, today social networking platforms, such as Facebook and Twitter, are bringing in a new type of revolution in the consumer world.

All the social network companies in the world are growing exponentially and changing the way how we interact, share and connect with each other in our personal life.

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Today, more and more people are using social networking applications on their mobile phones. We think that social and mobile will be how people will communicate predominantly and, going forward, these will be the models that companies will look for too.

Cloud 2 is about how to bring that social networking capability into enterprise. It is about being social and mobile.

During mid 2009, we found that we have more people who use social networking than those who use the Internet generally. Social networking sites, such as Facebook, have almost killed the E-mail era.

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With Cloud 2 what we try to do is to take the same kind of experience that is happening in the personal life to the enterprise.

The first application that we are bringing under this is Chatter. It brings the same kind of interface that Facebook has, such as a profile, friends, status updating, file sharing among friends. It can be used from a computer,or smartphones like iPhone, Blackberry etc.

Chatter brings the same kind of collaboration or communication that is happening on social networking platforms; however, in a private and secure manner for a company.

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It is meant for the next generation of employees. India has a large pool of young generation who use Facebook, Twitter, Orkut etc. With Chatter they can use the same experience in professional life as well.

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CIOL: Since all the social networking platforms are prone to vulnerabilities, how is security taken care of in Chatter?

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Chuck: Security is our key differentiator. Our 87,000 customers store very sensitive information on our applications.

All the security and privacy that we endorse on Salesforce.com are applicable to Chatter as well, such as SAS 120 Type 2, security or ISO 2027 1001.

Since Chatter is built into this platform it inherits all those features. Whatever is communicated in Chatter is confidential and does not leak.

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Chatter has the features of Facebook and Twitter; however, is not vulnerable as these sites are prone to be.

CIOL: How about the uptake for Chatter in India?

Chuck: Salesforce does not break down numbers as per market. However, with 42 percent year-over-year growth in the latest quarter, we have seen a good uptake for Chatter in India as well and have customers such as Bajaj, Godrej, etc.

With Chatter we are providing companies a private, secure social network called Chatter, wherein not just the sales or marketing people, but employees across all departments can use it for day-to-day affairs.

Now, since it is social and mobile, we hope this will drive lot more adoption across our customer base in India, which is an important market for us.

With the recently announced Chatter.com, we will open up the platform for free even to those who are not a customer of Salesforce.

Chatter.com will be beneficial for even educational institutions, small businesses, and big corporates.

CIOL: What do you think will drive the uptake of cloud in the Indian market?

Chuck: India is one of the fastest growing market in terms of IT spending. Companies as well the Indian government have started investing in IT today.

Cloud democratizes software, unlike in past. So, with cloud, access to such infrastructure is as simple as signing up for an online account, such as GMail, Yahoo Mail etc. All one needs to do is sign up for the service and start using it.

Small and medium businesses (SMBs), which account for 30 per cent of the total India Inc, and is a $45 billion worth industry today, play an important role in Indian market.

We believe that SMBs will obviously opt for cloud so that they get an equal footing in terms of technology on a global level.

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