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Microsoft, HP to Work Together to Deliver Unified Communications Solutions to Enterprise Customers

Posted on: Monday, 26 June 2006, 00:00 CDT

SAN FRANCISCO, June 26 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Expanding their existing strategic alliance, Microsoft Corp. and HP today announced a joint effort focused on accelerating the transformation of telephony, audio-, video- and webconferencing, and instant messaging into a single unified communications platform. Under this initiative, highlighted at a strategy event in San Francisco, HP will provide enterprise servers and systems integration services for new and enhanced products within Microsoft's unified communications platform, including Microsoft(R) Office Communications Server 2007, Microsoft Office Communicator 2007, Microsoft Office Live Meeting, Microsoft Office RoundTable(TM), Communicator phone experience and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007. HP's efforts, coupled with Microsoft's vision for unified communications, will help to enable simpler collaboration among information workers, providing businesses with new capabilities to leverage existing infrastructures and increase productivity.

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"This relationship signals a strategic effort from both companies to enable a seamless unified communications experience - one that provides flexibility for IT managers and allows information workers to easily collaborate with one another," said Anoop Gupta, corporate vice president of the Microsoft Unified Communications Group. "Our alliance with HP allows customers to bring together Microsoft's best-of -class unified communication platform with HP's proven servers and integration and support services."

Today's announcement expands Microsoft and HP's long-standing relationship dedicated to developing and delivering industry-standard information technology in both core businesses and new strategic markets while offering unmatched ownership satisfaction and value. Through their alliance, HP and Microsoft combine their respective strengths as industry leaders to bring enterprise businesses complete, integrated technology solutions that go in easily, provide superior reliability and include world-class service on demand.

"As Microsoft's only global Prime Integrator for Exchange Server, HP has deployed more than 15 million seats of Exchange 2003 for enterprise customers worldwide," said Robb Rasmussen, vice president, Consulting & Integration, HP Services. "Going beyond our past work together, this joint effort on innovation sets a precedent for what customers can expect to see from both companies in the future."

The Opportunity for Customers

Unified communications is about breaking down today's communications silos -- which include e-mail, instant messaging (IM), voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and webconferencing -- to deliver person-centric and presence-based communications, with single user identity across all modes. Microsoft and HP's expanded alliance provides enterprise customers with the ability to cost- effectively transition conventional PBX and voice mail communications systems to Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 and Exchange Server 2007.

HP will build on Microsoft's unified communication platform to create comprehensive enterprise communications solutions by providing the necessary server hardware and professional services, which include designing, integrating, managing and supporting these solutions for customers. This effort between Microsoft and HP allows enterprises to widely deploy innovative communication capabilities that span IP call management, conferencing, e-mail and unified messaging to enhance collaboration and productivity across individuals, teams and organizations.

About HP

HP is a technology solutions provider to consumers, businesses and institutions globally. The company's offerings span IT infrastructure, personal computing and access devices, global services and imaging and printing. For the four fiscal quarters ended April 30, 2006, HP revenue totaled $88.9 billion. More information about HP is available at http://www.hp.com/.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions. If such risks or uncertainties materialize or such assumptions prove incorrect, the results of HP and its consolidated subsidiaries could differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements and assumptions. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements, including but not limited to statements of the plans, strategies and objectives of management for future operations; any statements concerning expected development, performance or market share relating to products and services; anticipated operational and financial results; any statements of expectation or belief; and any statements of assumptions underlying any of the foregoing. Risks, uncertainties and assumptions include the achievement of expected results and other risks that are described from time to time in HP's Securities and Exchange Commission reports, including but not limited to the risks described in HP's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended April 30, 2006, and other reports filed after HP's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended Oct. 31, 2005. HP assumes no obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements.

Microsoft and RoundTable are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries.

The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

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Microsoft Corp.

CONTACT: Brandi Cook of Waggener Edstrom Worldwide, +1-503-443-7000,brandic@waggeneredstrom.com, or Rapid Response Team, Waggener EdstromWorldwide, +1-503-443-7070, rrt@waggeneredstrom.com; or Kristin Harlan of HP,+1-650-857-8467, kristin.harlan@hp.com

Web site: http://www.microsoft.com/http://www.hp.com/

Source: PRNewswire-FirstCall

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