• July 7, 2008

Press: The Future of eXpresso

eXpresso is almost a year old, and it seems there’s something else to get excited about every week. We continue to make great strides on the development front and more people are adopting eXpresso daily. And now, I’m seeing a brand transformation that’s very gratifying: perception is catching up with reality.

Last week, CIO Weblog published a “re-review” of eXpresso. Last year they initially categorized eXpresso as a very good, but nevertheless common, online spreadsheet product. That’s understandable and fair, given where we were then. At the time, Excel was the first application/document type we developed for eXpresso’s patent pending Always Live™ framework. With that first step, we successfully established a reputable foundation for hosting shared files and creating trusted communities for spreadsheet collaboration.

Now, after meeting benchmarks and proof-points, we are expanding the eXpresso filetypes to include all the popular document types we use everyday. People like Scott Wilson, the author of CIO Weblog, are among the first to put the whole picture together. After a closer look from the context of emerging Cloud platforms, industry experts are beginning to recognize eXpresso for what it is: the gateway for the billions of office documents within and among the new Cloud platforms.

In less than a year from now, business users will begin relying on Cloud platforms for daily services and application access. WebEx, Salesforce, IBM, Google, and Microsoft are all among the players that will be offering advanced Cloud products. I think there is a growing awareness of the value of a platform-neutral, multiple-filetype eXpresso in this coming Cloud platform boom. eXpresso could become a crucial part of the major Cloud platforms as the conduit for file collaboration across platforms, applications, or workgroups.

Our initial vision for eXpresso was very ambitious, but we knew we had to follow a disciplined development plan that didn’t immediately show off all eXpresso capabilities. I think the real secret of eXpresso’s role is now out.

• By George