Mr. Softee at your service ...

If you know anything about managing a complex email system like Lotus Notes or MS Exchange, you know it can be a pain. Most companies would prefer to leave it to the experts, especially smaller organizations. Microsoft brought out its online infrastructure services beta this week and will begin to make a name for itself in Managed Services. While the SaaS industry is in the early stages, Microsoft will need time to rework their software to support multitenant architectures. OCS doesn't support a multitenant instance either (by the way, all this means less money for Microsoft, could we see any more PE contraction?). This is still a beta offering for under 5,000 seats. The competitive set includes Google's Postini and Yahoo's Zimbra along with many other niche players. Other Microsoft partners already provide some of these services for enterprises. They will have to carefully maneuver their channel relationships because they rely on a substantial revenue stream from these service partners and systems integrators.