TAFKAWMC
by Volker Weber
IBM announces Lotus Expeditor:
"An open alternative to Microsoft® .NET client software, Lotus Expeditor provides the flexibility that comes from service oriented architecture (SOA) and open standards-based software, giving all users a universal client experience and allowing WebSphere Portal, Lotus Forms and Lotus Sametime users to extend their current applications world beyond the desktop," said Ken Bisconti, IBM Vice President of Workplace, Portal and Collaboration Products.
Hmmh. Workplace Forms is now Lotus Forms. And Workplace Managed Client is now Lotus Expeditor?
Comments
Whatever sells, Volker, whatever sells.
Good. Workplace is dead. Long live Lotus.
WebSphere Everyplace Deployment is now Lotus Expeditor. It is the 'workplace client technology' underneath Sametime 7.5, Notes "Hannover", and Workplace Managed Client.
...but I agree that you could characterize this as TAFKAWMC.
Its not TAFKAWMC but TAFKAWED (Websphere everyplace deployment). WMC was build on top of WED. Sametime 7.5 and Notes8 Hannover are build on top of Expeditor.
Looks like all end user facing products get back the Lotus Brand:
WED -> Lotus Expeditor
WECM -> Lotus Mobile Connect
Workplace Forms -> Lotus Forms
So who is betting on:
Websphere Portal -> Lotus Portal?
(said that before)
:-) stw
Forgot one... but that is not (???) End user facing:
Workplace Designer -> Lotus Component Designer
;-) stw
Yes, it is great to see the Lotus name used on these products.
Based on the comments above, should we expect the following name change:
IBM Corporation --> Lotus Development Corporation
And even a Stock ticker change ?
IBM --> LOTS
Volker I think you are on to something, keep digging ;-)
Stephan, noooooo, don’t associate the Lotus name with “portal”. Urgh ;o)
Just talked to a business person yesterday. He told me about Lotus Expidor (!), which they might use since Workplace did not really cut it. They needed to rewrite their SOA and open source based application to make it run offline. The re-branding exercise is going to solve all this. Hah.
Could they *try* to make this more confusing?
That's what marketing does. If a name does not stick, they come up with a new one. If they did not come up with a new one for a while, they do it anyway. :-)
I see this as a good thing, the more elements of the IBM productivity and workforce-related product set that sit within the Lotus brand the stronger it will be. For me, Lotus has always been known for innovative collaboration products, and therefore it made no sense for these products and technologies to sit under other IBM software pillars.
However, the IBM web seems very vague on the details of Expeditor (understandably given the recent nature of the announcement), but that doesn't help us Partners that need to know where this is leading. It is therefore vital that these topics are covered at Lotusphere, and preferably at Admin'06 in Vienna later this month too.
I agree with Stuart that rolling more (related) products under Lotus strengthens the brand, particularly when it results in a favorable matchup with the competing microsoft offering. One of the ways it does this is by reducing the impression that IBM's attention is shifting away from the Lotus brand, which has kept Notes in "maintenance mode" at several organizations I've encountered in recent years.
Isn't that like calling the next version of Visual Studio "Microsoft Office Enhancer".
Did I just see that Ken B's title is now VP, Lotus Software vs. VP, Workplace...