WALTHAM, Mass., Feb. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Novell today unveiled the long-term plans for its flagship collaboration product, Novell(R) GroupWise(R), including plans for three releases over the next four years. Novell's roadmap firmly underscores the status of GroupWise as an integral part of Novell's corporate strategy and emphasizes the vital role traditional Novell products play in the company's future.

The next release of GroupWise, codenamed "Sequoia," is due to be released in the summer of 2005, followed by "Aspen" and "Cedar," targeted for fall 2006 and spring 2008, respectively.

Novell GroupWise is a complete collaboration software solution providing enterprise users with e-mail, calendaring, instant messaging, task management, document management and data storage functions. The No. 1 alternative to Microsoft Exchange, GroupWise has long been praised by customers and industry watchers for its security and reliability. The next releases of GroupWise will build on this foundation with additional functionality and new ways to collaborate.

"While Novell continues to garner many positive reviews for our Linux and open source strategies, we also want to be clear that our faithful GroupWise customers can look forward to a bright future with Novell and GroupWise on the platform of their choice," said David Patrick, general manager of Platforms and Services for Novell. "Novell's commitment to GroupWise has never been stronger. Novell has been steadfast in delivering ongoing value in GroupWise, and customers can be assured they will continue to see an increase in that value going forward."

GroupWise Sequoia will provide significant enhancements for end users with interface improvements and new functionality. Novell is also improving the application programming and administration interfaces in GroupWise. Novell will announce details about GroupWise Sequoia at its annual BrainShare(R) customer conference in March in Salt Lake City.

In GroupWise Aspen, Novell plans to further team collaboration and provide new data backup capabilities. Novell will also focus on enabling more partner applications. To date, Novell partners have taken advantage of trusted application programming interfaces (API) to create more than 150 add-on products that run efficiently with GroupWise.

Charles Taite, president of GWAVA, a developer of software solutions for GroupWise, said, "Novell's commitment to GroupWise and the development of robust APIs has allowed GWAVA and many other partners to develop sophisticated solutions to meet a wide range of needs. The future of GroupWise is very bright as Novell continues to respond to the market and support the Novell GroupWise partner community."

The focus for GroupWise Cedar is to bring the rich functionality of GroupWise to users on any platform, anywhere at any time, to improve user experience, and to increase administrative functionality and grow scalability. This release will build on Sequoia and Aspen for team-enabled collaboration and further simplified administration.

More information about Novell GroupWise can be found at http://www.novell.com/products/groupwise . For information on Novell's BrainShare conference, see http://www.novell.com/brainshare . For information on Novell's partners, visit http://www.novell.com/partners .

About Novell

Novell, Inc. is a leading provider of information solutions that deliver secure identity management (Novell Nsure(R)), Web application development (Novell exteNd(TM)) and cross-platform networking services (Novell Nterprise(TM)), all supported by strategic consulting and professional services (Novell Ngage(SM). Active in the open source community with its Ximian(R) and SUSE(R) LINUX brands, Novell provides a full range of Linux products and services for the enterprise, from the desktop to the server. Novell's vision of one Net -- a world without information boundaries -- helps customers realize the value of their information securely and economically. For more information, call Novell's Customer Response Center at 888-321-4CRC (4272) or visit http://www.novell.com/ . Press should visit http://www.novell.com/pressroom .

NOTE: Novell, GroupWise, Nsure and Ximian are registered trademarks; exteNd and Nterprise are trademarks; BrainShare is a registered service mark; and Ngage is a service mark of Novell, Inc. in the United States and other countries. SUSE is a registered trademark of SUSE LINUX AG, a Novell business. *All third-party trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

CONTACT: Kevan Barney of Novell, Inc., +1-801-861-2931, or
kbarney@novell.com

Web site: http://www.novell.com/products/groupwise

Web site: http://www.novell.com/brainshare

Web site: http://www.novell.com/partners

Web site: http://www.novell.com/