July 6, 2011 – (HOSTSEARCH.COM) –
Open-Xchange, a leader in business-class email and groupware for cloud providers, announced an agreement with
STRATO, Europe's second-largest web host and services provider, bringing integrated online communication and teamwork to hosting customers in Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, U.K., France and Italy.
As of today, STRATO starts to provision Open-Xchange business-class webmail to all its shared-webhosting customers, which include more than 5 million email accounts. Existing and new STRATO customers will have access to the powerful AJAX-based email, contact and calendar management functionality as part of their hosting package. Users benefit from a single and central communication application, which integrates personal contacts from social networks like Facebook, LinkedIn or Xing, as well as email from external email accounts like Google Mail, GMX or Yahoo! Mail without any further interaction. The cloud-based application can be accessed with a standard Internet browser (without installing software) and via any PC, laptop, iPad or smartphone.
“We have chosen Open-Xchange as the leading cloud communication platform providing STRATO customers with integrated communication capabilities,” said Damian Schmidt, CEO of STRATO. “With Open-Xchange, we are enabling our customers to work more productively anywhere they have access to a browser and an Internet connection. STRATO customers will benefit from access to all of their relevant private and business data - like contacts on the various social networks - from one easy-to-use interface.”
Within the next months, all existing STRATO webmail accounts will be configured for Open-Xchange. Using the in-application upsell mechanism, STRATO customers will be able to easily upgrade to premium features without going through a complex storefront purchase process. Customers will benefit from advanced sharing and document management functions, as well as push-synchronization of email, contact and calendar information with smartphones, including iPhone, Android-based devices, Nokia, Windows Mobile. Through the free webmail offering, STRATO customers can get to know the benefits of Open-Xchange without any obligation and extend to a complete groupware solution or mobile solution at any time.
“With more than 24 million users, Open-Xchange is now the world's leading technology supplier of hosted groupware,” said Rafael Laguna, CEO of Open-Xchange. “Providing consumers and businesses with the next-level cloud-based communication platform, Open-Xchange is the perfect partner for STRATO to differentiate in a highly-competitive hosting market.”
Open-Xchange is the only business-class email and groupware solution specifically designed to meet the needs of SaaS providers. The software is built on proven open source technologies, enables seamless integration into existing infrastructures, and can scale up to millions of users.
Open-Xchange integrates email, calendar, contact and task management with advanced groupware features such as information management and document sharing. Appointments and team meetings can be scheduled efficiently with joined team calendars. Using shared folders, team members get access to all important documents, tasks, appointments and contacts. Central storage of documents prevents duplicated work and reduces the amount of email traffic. Cutting-edge social network integration enables aggregation of email and contact information from external mail services and social networks.
About STRATO
STRATO, a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom, is Europe's second-largest web hosting and web application provider. Its services include the online hard drive (HiDrive), all-in-one web hosting packages, dedicated and virtual servers, and hosted business software such as online shops. STRATO has over 1.4 million customer contracts in six countries and hosts 4 million domains in two ISO-certified, climate-neutral data centers.
About Open-Xchange
Open-Xchange is the innovator of scalable and integrated open source email and collaboration solutions for enterprises, academic institutions and government authorities. The company provides on-premises versions called Open-Xchange Server Edition and Open-Xchange Advanced Server Edition, along with Open-Xchange Hosting Edition, which enables web hosting companies to provide an easy-to-use and feature-rich application delivered as Software as a Service (SaaS). The Open-Xchange Hosting Edition is architected to integrate into a hosting provider’s existing infrastructure, such as authentication, provisioning, billing, and email storage and does not require that these systems be replaced.
