TARRYTOWN, N.Y., July 14 /PRNewswire/ -- Open-Xchange Inc. announced today a software partner agreement with Red Hat, Inc. , the world's leading provider of open source to the enterprise, and the release of Open-Xchange Server 5, the industry's first fully supported, modular, platform agnostic open-source collaboration platform for Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Open-Xchange enables easy migration and integration to an open source environment -- allowing IT administrators to create and implement killer-apps without changing existing infrastructure components, i.e. databases, directory services, message transfer agents, e-mail servers or web-servers. End users can keep their favorite mail and groupware client -- most often Outlook, but also open source clients such as Kontact.

According to the agreement, Open-Xchange Server is now certified for the Red Hat Enterprise Server and Red Hat Application Server platform. Red Hat will provide Open-Xchange Inc. with open source technology and services as part of the Software Partner Agreement for distribution with Open-Xchange products. Open-Xchange Inc. will offer bundles for new customers and upgrade bundles for customers who want to migrate from SUSE LINUX Openexchange Server to the Red Hat platform. Customers can see a demonstration of the new solution at Linux World Expo in San Francisco, beginning August 9 at the Open-Xchange booth number 453.

"We are happy to be able to support Open-Xchange Inc. and its Open-Xchange Server 5," said Paul Salazar, director of Marketing for Red Hat EMEA. "Enterprise-ready open source solutions mean that more customers can migrate from proprietary environments to lower cost, higher performance solutions. We are pleased to support another choice for customers building open source architectures based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux."

"By providing a supported Open-Xchange on Red Hat's Enterprise Linux versions, customers now have real platform choices when it comes to deploying enterprise installations -- and this is what customers want: choice, said Frank Hoberg, CEO of Open-Xchange, "It's exciting to be able to offer Open-Xchange on the world's leading Linux platform."

The functionality offered by Open-Xchange Server 5 will include all that is available in the open-source Open-Xchange Server 0.8, with the addition of:

* Significantly enhanced Microsoft Outlook and Palm connectors (compared to SUSE LINUX Openexchange Server predecessor connectors to SLOX): -- Shared folders -- Distribution lists -- Documents attached to specific objects -- Microsoft Outlook categories compatibility -- Synchronization with .pst files -- On-line and off-line functionality * A web interface for administrators * Enhanced web interfaces to set up user preferences * Web-based contextual on-line help for users * Administrator and user manuals * Five years of guaranteed maintenance * Maintenance with update and upgrade protection for server modules and connectors * Standard service and support offerings for installation About Open-Xchange

Open-Xchange Server, the engine behind Novell's award-winning SUSE LINUX Openexchange Server, maintains the same architecture, but with added and enhanced features in a more flexibly designed, platform-agnostic package.

Open-Xchange enables users to store appointments, contacts, tasks, emails, bookmarks, documents -- and many more elements -- and share them with other users. This environment can be accessed via any web browser -- as well as multiple fat clients like Outlook, Palm, KDE Kontact, Apple's iCAL, Konqueror, Mozilla Calendar, and more.

Third party products -- open source or proprietary -- can access Open-Xchange through various interfaces such as WebDAV (XML), LDAP, iCal, and HTTP/S. Open-Xchange is based on open source daemons and services: a web (HTTP/S) server (like Apache), a servlet engine (like Tomcat), a database (like PostgreSQL), a directory server (like OpenLDAP), and a mail (both SMTP and IMAP) server (like Postfix using Cyrus); just to list a few.

The administration framework is implemented using XML-RPC (Remote Procedure Calls). Additional XML-based APIs, and support for common open standards such as ICAL, VCARD and VTODO will help developers access the core modules.

Pricing and Availability

Open-Xchange Server 5 for Red Hat Enterprise Server 4 is available immediately at http://www.open-xchange.com/ and through a list of select partners.

Open-Xchange Server 5 Small Business Server Edition (5-25 users) -- including one-year maintenance, administration interfaces, initial installation support, Outlook and Palm connectors and a five-year guarantee, is $295 for the first five users. An annual maintenance subscription fee for additional users is $25 per user.

Open-Xchange Server 5 Advanced Server Edition (25+ users) for Red Hat -- including one-year maintenance, administration interfaces, initial installation support, Outlook and Palm connectors and a five-year guarantee is $850. An annual maintenance subscription fee for additional users is $25 per user.

About Red Hat, Inc.

Red Hat, the world's leading open source and Linux provider, is headquartered in Raleigh, NC with satellite offices spanning the globe. Red Hat is leading Linux and open source solutions into the mainstream by making high quality, low cost technology accessible. Red Hat provides operating system software along with middleware, applications and management solutions. Red Hat also offers support, training and consulting services to its customers worldwide and through top-tier partnerships. Red Hat's Open Source strategy offers customers a long-term plan for building infrastructures that are based on and leverage open source technologies with focus on security and ease of management. Learn more: http://www.redhat.com/

About Open-Xchange Inc.

Based in Tarrytown, NY, Open-Xchange Inc. (http://www.open-xchange.com/) is the world's leading Linux-based groupware, collaboration, and messaging provider. Open-Xchange's flagship product, Open-Xchange Server, comes in a free open source version, OX 0.8, and a commercial version, Open-Xchange 5.0. Olpe, Germany-based Netline Internet Service has been developing java-based, three-tier web applications since 1996 and continues to be the contract developer of Open-Xchange. Netline also provides the core collaboration engine for SUSE LINUX Open-Xchange Server. Netline is also a licensed reseller of Open-Xchange Inc.

CONTACT: Bill Baker of Baker Communications Group, +1-860-350-9100,
wbaker@bakercg.com, for Open-Xchange Inc.

Web site: http://www.open-xchange.com/
http://www.redhat.com/