14 DAY TRIAL // A little more than two months since Xandros jumped on board of Microsoft's Windows-Linux interoperability and intellectual property assurance wagon, the two companies revealed in a joint announcement that they are expanding their collaboration. In this context, Microsoft and Xandros will focus on growing the interoperability bridge between their respective email servers with the help of the Redmond company's email protocols.
"The expansion of our agreement with Xandros is a strong example of how collaboration through intellectual property licensing can foster innovation that benefits the overall IT ecosystem," said Horacio Gutierrez, vice president, Intellectual Property and Licensing at Microsoft.
Xandros' Scalix Mail Servers will from now on be able to synchronize with Microsoft Exchange Server over wireless network connections. But the data synchronization is not limited to Exchange Server. Scalix Mail Servers will also be able to offer interoperability with additional email clients implementing the Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync protocol and the Outlook Exchange Transport Protocol, through the new messaging protocol license and collaboration agreement signed with Microsoft.
"Today's enterprise users 'on the go' employ a plethora of mobile messaging devices to access a mix of Linux and Windows-based messaging systems," said Andreas Typaldos, CEO of Xandros. "With the ubiquity of Windows Mobile -based Smartphones, this agreement will enable us to provide the same range of Scalix connectivity choices for users of desktop, laptop and handheld devices that they currently enjoy with Microsoft Exchange. With this new Scalix interoperability, Microsoft and Xandros enable companies to freely implement a broad range of proprietary and open systems and devices."
Via the agreement, Xandros will be able to access the specification and documentation designed to allow the server-side implementation of the Exchange ActiveSync protocol. Additionally, the Linux provider will also be offered the resources to integrate the Outlook-Exchange Transport Protocol into the Scalix Mail Server.
"For Xandros, the agreement is another milestone in its strategic vision to deliver a complete Linux stack, including desktops, servers, Windows-Linux cross-platform management tools and mission-critical applications, in order to provide single vendor support for diverse and growing enterprise IT infrastructures, and to make certain that its stack is interoperable and integrates within existing customer IT infrastructure ecosystems, for both platforms, applications and messaging", Microsoft added.