In a move that pits it against Google, Microsoft, and IBM, Cisco has thrown the gauntlet into the ring of hosted e-mail with a focus on the business market. Their new e-mail service (WebEx Mail) allows users to look at their e-mail from any browser or any computer via remote e-mail hosting. WebEx Mail offers 5 GB of storage for each account (which can be upgraded to 35 GB), and Cisco offers a 99.9% uptime guarantee (SLA). Unfortunately no prices are available publicly. ”Cisco believes that collaboration will drive the next era of business productivity, and effective collaboration will not be possible without communications,” Barry O’Sullivan, a senior vice president of Cisco, said of the new service offerings.
Will Cisco be able to offer services that compete with the already saturated market for online collaborative tools? Competing with Microsoft, Google, and IBM in any market is clearly going to be a challenge, but if any company is going to do it effectively, a large communications company like Cisco will be able to do so.
Why is Cisco jumping into the hosted e-mail market? As Tony Bates, another Cisco senior vice president puts it, “The reason we are getting into mail, to be quite candid, is not to be a mail provider. Email is an environment in which people collaborate in and we want to be a part of the succession of experiences. The best way I can explain it is that we are redefining the collaboration experience. Email is part of that.”
It is unclear whether or not WebEx e-mail has enough features to differentiate itself from Microsoft’s, Google’s, and IBM’s products in order to warrant a switch.
