After W2K? Services, Services
CMP Media Inc. - Saturday, March 04, 2000
Mar. 03, 2000 (Computer Reseller News - CMP via COMTEX) -- Redmond,
Wash. - Microsoft Corp. is busy crafting a whole slew of Windows.com services
for its "Business Internet" strategy and new channel of ASPs.
One is a future release of Windows 2000, code-named "Blackcomb," being built
specifically for data centers, service providers and Web farms, said sources
briefed by Microsoft. The operating system will feature a new Internet user
interface and support for digital streaming media, the sources said.
"Release 3, or Blackcomb, will be the first release in which Microsoft begins to
deliver on the Next-Generation Windows Services (NGWS) vision," said one
source. "Single-system workload management, job scheduling and resource
management/tracking will be critically important. Combined with IA-64
'Madison'-based systems, scalability will no longer be an issue with Windows."
Windows 2000 release 3.0, not expected until the first half of 2003, will be the
next major upgrade after the "Whistler," or version 2.0 of Windows 2000, due
next year.
While the vision will take some time to materialize, Microsoft plans to unveil
some portions of its NGWS hosting platform and new mega-services in early
May. Plans include a new "dialogue"-based user interface for NGWS, sources
said. In late February, Microsoft debuted ClearLead, one of its first NGWSes.
Microsoft also is working on new mega-services platforms, such as the
Exchange Mega Hosting Service, sources said. This is a messaging and
knowledge-worker services platform designed by the server applications hosting
group to handle the needs of ASPs and Microsoft's own services offerings, such
as bCentral, and VerticalNet, in which it invested $100 million in January. There
are also plans for a SQL Server Hosting Service.
With Steve Ballmer now at the helm as chief executive, Microsoft is redefining
itself as a services company. At a recent Goldman Sachs & Co. conference,
Ballmer told attendees Windows will cease to be a product.
Microsoft's NGWS and mega-services represent the first stage of that journey,
observers said.
"Microsoft is becoming much, much more of an Internet company," said Joe
Biggs, director of the Microsoft practice at Banyan Worldwide Services,
Westboro, Mass. "They're now orienting their products to be very ASP-oriented."
The software giant envisions a slew of service opportunities for its traditional
solution providers and systems integrators. These include online provisioning,
trouble management, remote administration and consolidated billing.
However, ASPs and service providers such as Digex Inc. and Data Return Corp.
represent Microsoft's new partner focus. Digex is in a three-year project with
Microsoft and Compaq Computer Corp. to build a Digex/Microsoft ASPTone
hosting platform. "Microsoft wants to enable the service provider, who in turn
services the ASPs," said Ellen Lynn, director of channel development at Digex,
Beltsville, Md. Toward that end, the Redmond, Wash.-based company is
developing network Quality of Service components including RSVP, Integrated
Services and Differential Services for service providers and network operators.
And Microsoft is creating a management system capable of managing more than
1,000-server farms, sources said. |
