OmniPod-AOL alliance benefits iChat users
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
Apr 20, 2005 at 12:30am
Omnipod, a leading provider of On-Demand secure Enterprise Instant Messaging, has announced an alliance with America Online to enable its customers to leverage connectivity from Omnipod’s secure IM network to the AOL Messaging Network.
Through AOL’s Enterprise Federation Partner (EFP) program, Omnipod can offer companies federated access to the AOL Messaging Network, which includes the AIM and ICQ services, as well as Netscape and Apple iChat users worldwide. Omnipod users will also be able to communicate using their familiar AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) Buddy List or ICQ Contact List feature directly from Omnipod’s Windows and Java clients, connecting Omnipod’s secure enterprise network with AOL’s 14 million at-work IM users.
“We believe that Federation with AOL’s Messaging Network adds significant value to our platform by extending our network to the nation’s largest public IM network,” said Gideon Stein, Omnipod’s CEO. “Federation will allow our customers to connect in real time not only with co-workers, but with their vendors, partners and customers who use the AOL Messaging Network.”
The Omnipod Professional Online Desktop (POD) will support both Omnipod and AOL Messaging Network users through a single interface. All information entered on the POD is transmitted via 168bit 3DES SSL encryption. Omnipod adds security, management and control tools to address IT concerns, and federation facilitates the enterprise’s access to AOL’s IM users. For more on this, see their April 14, 2004 press release.
About Omnipod
Omnipod was founded in 1999 to develop an enterprise-class communications framework integrating instant messaging, file sharing and other communications functions into a highly secure, centrally controlled infrastructure. Omnipod’s Professional Online Desktop (POD) is rapidly deployable, easy-to-use and maintenance-free. The POD is presently deployed with a number of organizations and Fortune 500 companies in a cross section of industries.
Traditional enterprise intranets and extranets require complex software, expensive server equipment and a dedicated internal support staff to maintain systems and train users. The POD is a unique communications platform that is cost-effective, highly secure and centrally controlled. With a flexible and easily customizable interface, the POD is built to incorporate legacy systems, reflect virtually any identity and provide a framework through which users can communicate with anyone on virtually any device.
Omnipod’s data center facility at AT&T provides physical security, network redundancy, scalability, optimal environmental conditions, and full-time network monitoring. Our robust hardware and software infrastructure utilizes products from Sun Microsystems, Cisco, and Oracle and is built to serve hundreds of thousands of simultaneous users.
Check out the Omnipodtest drive while visiting the site.
A Possible Twist to Apple’s iPod?
Interesting that Omnipod’s Portable Online Desktop architecture utilizes Sun technology as does the Xito Portable Object Desktop: a pure Java based, cross-platform, object-oriented desktop environment that provides access to network based applications, including: Java applets, Java applications(JNLP) and Web apps. Come to think of it, Apple’s iPod utilizes Pixo from Sun Microsystems which provides network operators with Java technology-based server software to manage the secure distribution and monetization of digital content for end users’ mobile devices. Hmm, could we possibly think of Apple’s iPod as an Internet Portable Object Desktop? Seems crazy doesn’t it? Well, perhaps that’ll be explored in another article next month. Keep it in mind.
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Contributor
Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
