1&1 and SaaS Mobile Support
1&1 Internet Adds Mobile Support For Open-Xchange Based SaaS Solution
Customers get new emails, tasks, and appointments automatically synchronized
with their mobile devices; Outlook Connector added to all standard packages
TARRYTOWN, NY, November 28, 2007 – 1&1 Internet, the world’s largest web host by known servers, today announced a new push email and PIM (personal information management, e.g., contacts and calendar) synchronization solution for its hosted email and collaboration packages delivered by Open-Xchange Inc.’s award winning Smart Collaboration™ technology. This push service based on Funambol’s open source technology will be available first in Germany as of December, and subsequently together with the launch of the hosted email and groupware offering in US, UK and France within the first half of 2008.
1&1 utilizes the Open-Xchange platform for a range of 1&1 branded MailXchange email and collaboration packages to be launched worldwide. 1&1 MailXchange offers the full set of personal information management (“PIM”) functionality – email, calendaring, contacts and task management together with advanced groupware features such as Documail and Smart Document Sharing. The solution delivers valuable functionality for small businesses and individuals, enabling them to work remotely by providing communications at very low price points.
Through the 1&1 Control Center, customers get a free software client for all smartphones and pocket PCs using Windows 5.0 and Windows 6.0. Provided that customers have a contract with their carrier for data transfer, they automatically get emails, appointments, contacts and tasks pushed to their mobile devices.
“With the Introduction of our new interface for mobile synchronization, MailXchange’s functionality is head to head with our competitors,“ said Andreas Gauger, 1&1 chairman of the board. “Freelancers, SMEs and field staff among others will benefit most from our communication stack, completely built on open source software.“
“Business users and consumers want easy-to-use mobile messaging and collaboration capabilities such as Personal Information Management services, on all the devices they use, anywhere, anytime at a reasonable cost,” said Gerald Labie, CEO of Open-Xchange. “The market potential for mobile SaaS solutions is tremendous. Our three way partnership is a major step forward in meeting this need.”
“1&1 is leading the way into a new mobile market in which many more people can receive compelling mobile services such as push email at a fraction of the cost of proprietary alternatives,” said Fabrizio Capobianco, Funambol CEO. “We are pleased to work with 1&1 and Open-Xchange as this will set a precedent for how service providers can utilize open source to address a major new portion of the market and provide profitable mobile services.”
Today’s move is another indication of 1&1’s progress within the global ‘Software as a Service’ (SaaS) market. The company’s mass roll-out of Open-Xchange and Funambol technology represents 1&1’s confidence in open source alternatives, and its commitment to the open source community.
1&1’s use of the open source platforms from Open-Xchange and Funambol equip customers with the very latest features at a much lower price than comparable products. The open source nature of the solutions facilitates seamless integration within 1&1’s back-end email systems. Open-Xchange provides high performance and reliability and offers 1&1 greater scalability than similar licensed solutions. Moreover, Open-Xchange’s and Funambol’s open standards and APIs (Application Programming Interface) enabled a seamless integration into 1&1’s business processes, such as user provisioning, systems management and billing processes.
Pricing and availability
MailXchange accounts include 5 GB of storage for email and 2 GB more to store and share documents in private folders. MailXchange’s AJAX-based web interface is always accessible to users, regardless of platform. To further facilitate adoption, MailXchange supports standard groupware clients, such as Microsoft Outlook. As MailXchange supports the WebDAV interface, documents can be easiliy accessed through Windows Explorer as well. 1&1 MailXchange accounts will be available as a standalone package and as a add-on for existing hosting customers. Accounts start at 4.99 Euro per month for a single user, going down to 1.99 Euro per month for quantities of 100 accounts or more.
About Open-Xchange Hosting Edition
The Open-Xchange Hosting Edition is the only groupware solution designed specifically to meet the needs of hosting providers. It has been architected to integrate into a hosting provider’s existing infrastructure such as authentication, provisioning, billing, and email storage rather than require that these systems be replaced. Open-Xchange Hosting Edition is built on enterprise proven open source technologies, such as Apache and MySQL, and is able to scale up to millions of users.
Open-Xchange Hosting Edition offers multi-tenant and multi-domain capabilities, enabling web hosters to serve hundreds of thousands of clients in a virtual server environment. This ensures a maximum level of service and customer satisfaction, while making best use of existing hardware resources. Open-Xchange Hosting Edition offers the necessary services and interfaces to integrate into automated administration, deployment and monitoring tools, ensuring 24/7 uptime 365 days a year.
Open-Xchange’s award winning Smart Collaboration™ technology combines email, calendaring, contacts and task management with advanced groupware features such as Documail and Document Sharing. Productivity is enhanced through unique teamwork features, like team view, centralized document sharing, and shared calendars, contacts, tasks and documents. In addition, the option of synchronizing with Microsoft Outlook is available.
About 1&1 Internet Inc.
1&1 Internet Inc. is a subsidiary of United Internet, a profitable public company with a market cap of $4 billion. 1&1 was established in 1992 and hosts more than 8 million domain names, while more than 40,000 servers run on the company’s five state-of-the-art data centers. 1&1’s global community is over 7 million customer contracts strong. The company’s U.S. headquarters is located in Chesterbrook, PA. For more information, please contact the company at http://www.1and1.com or 1-877-461-2631.
About OpenXchange
Open-Xchange Inc. is the innovator of scalable and integrated open source messaging and collaboration solutions for small and medium-sized enterprises, academic institutions and government authorities (“SME”). Its products are available directly from the company, through partners and Software-as-a-Service providers. Open-Xchange provides SME’s with state-of-the-art messaging and collaboration solutions traditionally only accessible to large corporations. By empowering SME’s, Open-Xchange helps them compete more effectively in the global economy. Open-Xchange Inc. is a privately held holding company headquartered in Tarrytown, NY, with research and development in Olpe and Nuremberg, Germany and operations in the US and Germany. For more information, please visit www.open-xchange.com.