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IBM Lotus Symphony Embraces Mac, Recruits Channel Partners
Is IBM gearing up to disrupt Microsoft Office? Apparently so. In fact, Big Blue is bringing Lotus Symphony 1.2 -- an open source application suite -- to the Mac. (Lotus Symphony already runs on Linux and Windows.) And IBM is recruiting channel partners to back Symphony. Here's the scoop.
The VAR Guy
November 5, 2008
3 Min Read
Is IBM gearing up to disrupt Microsoft Office? Apparently so. In fact, Big Blue is bringing Lotus Symphony 1.2 — an open source application suite — to the Mac. (Lotus Symphony already runs on Linux and Windows.) And IBM is recruiting channel partners to back Symphony. Here’s the scoop.
Lotus Symphony is based on OpenOffice.org, the open source productivity suite. Initially, Symphony supported Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Edition, Ubuntu, Windows XP and Windows Vista.
Tuning Up for the Mac
But demand for a Mac version has been overwhelming, according to The VAR Guy’s own discussions with IBM. Now, IBM Lotus is answering that demand. In an a blog entry posted Nov. 4, IBM Lotus states:
Lotus Symphony release 1.2 is now available and includes Beta support for the Mac OS X platform in English. I know many of you have been waiting for this new platform and hope you will take the time to try it out and give us your feedback. We expect to have a Generally Available version for Mac in all the languages we support in 1Q09.
In addition to the Mac OS support, we have added some new enhancements to our Data Pilot support in our spreadsheet tool and have made the Ubuntu platform Generally Available. We’ve also made some performance improvements. For all the details on what’s included in this release take a look at the release notes.
As always we welcome your feedback and suggestions so let us know how we are doing.
Music to Partners’ Ears?
At the same time, IBM Lotus has started to recruit partners to back Symphony. While details are still sketchy, Lotus Channel Marketing Manager Ronald Furmaniuk states:
The Symphony team is pleased to release a new addition to this site that highlights Partner services, integrations and offerings using Lotus Symphony – the Lotus Symphony Business Partner Page.
The growing Symphony partner community can now easily reach the expanding Symphony user community and demonstrate their skills and expertise.
If you are a customer searching for new solution to help your business check out this new Partner page. If you are a partner and have an offering you would like to add to the site, contact us today. Come back often to stay current with the latest and greatest offerings as the Partner list increases.
Translation: Lotus Symphony is coming to the IT channel, and IBM Lotus is seeking integration and distribution partners.
Next Moves
The VAR Guy is celebrating. He has yet to try Lotus Symphony 1.2 for the Mac, but he knows there’s a market for the application suite. Our resident blogger has been frustrated by other OpenOffice variants on the Mac — including NeoOffice.
In fact, The VAR Guy abandoned NeoOffice for the Mac in January 2008 and switched back to Microsoft Office.
But there are bigger story themes here. N-able, IBM and other channel-focused companies are serious about supporting Mac OS X because Apple is enjoying a renaissance in business.
And Microsoft — for the first time in about a decade — could face reasonable competition in the office productivity suite market.
The VAR Guy is updated multiple times daily. Don’t miss a single post. Subscribe to his newsletter, RSS and Twitter feed.
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