Microsoft takes aim as RIM battles in court

IDG News Service - With Research In Motion Ltd.'s (RIM) BlackBerry service in danger of a shutdown for patent violations, Microsoft Corp. is ready to exploit the opportunity with its own "push" e-mail offering.

The timing of the court struggle could help Microsoft, which has been maneuvering its own Direct Push Technology for e-mail for the Pocket PC and smart-phone market. Microsoft says the technology should be available by the middle of the year, making a head-first slide into a heated market.

IT managers using BlackBerry software are caught in limbo, worried they suddenly might not have a wireless e-mail service, said Gartner analyst Monica Basso. Many enterprises planned to deploy more BlackBerries, and the litigation has thrown in doubt whether they should proceed or look at other options, she said.

"[IT managers] are supposed to keep providing high quality of service for their executives," Basso said. "They can't afford to have it shut down overnight."

Microsoft is listening eagerly to those concerns. RIM's legal problems are "causing a lot of customers to come to us and ask about it," Scott Horn, general manager for the mobile and embedded devices group, said in an interview this week.

"It's caused a lot of companies to say, 'Wow, mobile e-mail is really important, messaging is very important, and it's an enterprise mission-critical thing for my company,'" Horn said.

NTP Inc. is seeking an injunction against RIM to shut down its BlackBerry service in the U.S. After NTP won its patent infringement lawsuit against RIM, an injunction was issued in 2003 but was then stayed while the case was on appeal. An appeals court later upheld the infringement ruling.

On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court said it wouldn't review the dispute, and now a U.S. District Court will decide on damages and whether to impose a permanent injunction against RIM. An injunction could shut down the sale of devices and services by RIM in the U.S.

That could force Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM's push e-mail customers to look for new products; Microsoft, naturally, is willing to oblige.

A free upgrade for its Windows Mobile 5.0 software, called the Messaging and Security Feature Pack, is being tested now by device manufacturers and mobile phone operators, Horn said. That upgrade -- along with an existing upgrade for Exchange Server 2003 released in October -- enables push e-mail with Microsoft's software.

Devices equipped with the upgrade will ship in the first half of this year, Horn said.

Businesses are increasingly asking about deployment strategies and security issues with mobile devices, Horn