SAN FRANCISCO (CNN/Money) -
It's been a long time since we heard anyone talk seriously about server-based, or hosted, desktop applications.
Sure, pedigreed names such as Oracle and Sun Microsystems once touted the concept of moving desktop applications off the desktop, but except for application-specific companies like Salesforce.com, no one's been able to successfully persuade IT managers to migrate their companies' desktop productivity suites to the server.
I'll issue a caveat here: I haven't been very successful in my predictions for network-based desktop computing either. In fact, in one of my first blown calls as a technology observer back in 1996, I fell for Larry Ellison's network-computer concept and thought it would be a surefire success.
Now I'm a skeptic where Web-based desktop applications are concerned, and I never believed that products such as Sun's StarOffice suite would take off.
A new contender
Despite this skepticism, however, I think I may have finally found a winning concept: IBM's new Workplace Client Technology.
Big Blue announced the initiative on Monday, and the new offering will be available before the end of the quarter, according to Ken Bisconti, vice president for Lotus Workplace products at IBM.
It will likely take some time (a year, perhaps) for IT execs to grasp the value and potential of the program, but based on what I've heard from the company and a smattering of analysts, I'm bullish on its prospects.
IBM's new program allows companies to subscribe to desktop applications rather than purchase software suites. It's an alternative to the current model that has made Microsoft so overwhelmingly successful.
Businesses can subscribe to a fleet of Microsoft Office-compatible programs for tasks such as e-mail and document management or simply select individual programs they need. What's more, the IBM infrastructure can be used by companies to develop their own proprietary software applications.
A cost-effective alternative?
The offering makes sense to companies that are realizing they're not using the whole array of applications included in Microsoft's desktop suites.
While hardware costs have dropped steadily over the years, desktop-application software costs have not, in part due to the paucity of business-ready Microsoft alternatives.
With a respected name like IBM now offering companies a more flexible, cost-effective way to parcel out desktop applications -- combined with the fact that Microsoft's next new operating system won't be available until 2006 -- I think you'll see companies begin to explore desktop alternatives.
"There isn't a player on the desktop that's at greater risk of losing share to IBM here than Microsoft," says Rob Enderle, an analyst with the Enderle Group.
"Companies have always liked the subscription approach. It sets expenses for the software. What they haven't liked is the performance hit that came with subscription services in the past."
With improvements in browser technology and an increase in broadband penetration, those performance problems likely have been resolved.
My colleague Paul LaMonica wrote in October that IBM suffers from a lofty problem: Its stock seems stuck in admittedly rarefied air. The company's stock generally trades in a narrow range, impervious to the steady climbs of many of its tech brethren.
Initiatives such as Workplace Client Technology, however, could eventually provide some of the revenue and margin growth that foster stock momentum. I'm watching this one.
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