Salesforce delivers 'Cloud 2.0 collaboration' with Chatter for Mobile

Chatter for Mobile is next paradigm in computing, says Salesforce's Benioff

In an exuberant presentation at London’s South Bank Centre today, Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff launched Chatter for Mobile, a collaboration tool available for Apple and RIM handheld devices.

The product resembles Facebook and enables employees in an organisation to collaborate as if they were using the social networking tool. Chatter was launched in January this year, but the emphasis today was on the mobile version of the software.

Mobile and social media collaboration was described by Benioff as "Cloud 2.0 " - a new paradigm in computing.

Staff using Chatter for Mobile update their status by responding to a 'What are you working on?' box - as opposed to the 'What's on your mind?' prompt that Facebook users receive - and will follow relevant colleagues and sales deals.

The product has been launched for the iPad, the iPhone and BlackBerry, with Chatter for the Android platform due to be released in early 2011.

When asked why he was developing applications for different platforms as opposed to just one web browser, Benioff explained that the company was actually doing both.

“The iPad application has a Cocoa frame, which makes it seem as though it is a native app but it actually runs on a high-fidelity HTML5. We are creating some apps natively, but many are run via servers.”

Benioff explained that the new generation of workers, who have grown up with the web and use collaborative social media, would liken the technology run by many IT departments today to exhibits in the San Jose tech museum.

“Lotus Notes was conceived before the CEO of Facebook [Mark Zuckerberg],” he joked.

Salesforce has rolled out Chatter for Mobile internally and Benioff said that he has personally seen a 40 per cent reduction in emails sent and received at work.

He also said that he was reorganising the company's renumeration system because the software showed which staff were working hardest and most collaboratively.

"It shows who the rock stars are," he said.

Risk management company Mysis rolled out Chatter for Mobile 60 days ago and Kimberly Jansen, CRM systems programme manager at the company, said: “The product is great for new starters, they get an immediate insight into whose in charge of what immediately.”

Simon Wheeldon is CEO of startup company Cloud Apps, which provides sustainable business solutions to corporations, and also uses Chatter for Mobile. He explained during a morning roundtable at the event that because the product runs from the same platform as other automated business processes, energy or water meters can also chatter and keep staff informed of important sustainability data.

“This means that the business as a whole can start to understand these metrics,” he said.

Salesforce also released some research alongside the launch which surveyed 600 organisations and found that 38 per cent of workers at these organisations were suffering from information overload, with seven out of 10 arguing that email was the worst culprit.

Robin Daniels, director of product marketing at Salesforce.com said: “Another problem with email is that is was not designed for collaboration and where several people are working in tandem it can make versioning of documents confusing.”