HP Taps New Microsoft Office System to Deliver Solutions and Services that Streamline Business Operations and Improve Collaboration(email this article)

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 21, 2003--HP (Company Profile, Past Stories, Case Studies) (NYSE:HPQ - News) today announced a portfolio of nine solutions and services based on the new Microsoft Office System that help streamline business processes and improve collaboration for businesses of all sizes. The offerings, built on Web services, help customers improve organizational productivity by providing access to critical business data and integration with business processes.

The solutions and services help enterprises take advantage of the HP Adaptive Enterprise strategy by enhancing their responsiveness to market changes and customer demand. Enterprises can gain competitive advantage and increased business agility by enhancing worker productivity through improved collaboration and information sharing among employees, partners and customers. Small- and medium-size businesses can gain greater ease of use, reliability and more service and support at competitive prices.

For businesses of all sizes, HP solutions -- built upon industry-standard platforms from Microsoft and HP -- help strengthen the link between business and IT. These solutions help reduce bottom-line costs, improve information access and enhance automation of business processes, collaboration and decision-making, while leveraging existing investments in desktop and enterprise applications.

Building on HP's expertise with Microsoft .NET technologies, Microsoft Office, SharePoint 2003, Exchange Server 2003 and Microsoft Windows Server 2003, the portfolio is available worldwide through more than 1,500 HP Services professional consultants with expertise in Microsoft Office System technologies as well as Web services. These specialists are part of a worldwide team of 23,000 Microsoft-trained HP professionals.

"Our breadth and depth of services and solutions built on Microsoft technology will enable customers to adapt and respond to change quickly, with improved collaboration and decision-making," said Ann Livermore, executive vice president, HP Services. "Backed by 20 years of experience designing, developing and delivering reliable, agile, adaptive business solutions with Microsoft, HP is the brand of choice to deliver Microsoft Office System-based information worker productivity solutions to global enterprises and small- and medium-size businesses."

Included in the portfolio are:

HP Correspondence and Case Management, using the HP Document Information System framework, builds on the Microsoft Office System technologies, including Office 2003, SharePoint 2003 and InfoPath. The solution provides comprehensive workflow routing capabilities, addressing organizational requirements for managing, controlling and sharing organizational data and document tracking.

HP Education Learning Portal Solution facilitates communication among teachers, parents, students and administrators. Customized to the school's needs, the solution provides a standard interface for accessing and sharing education applications and student data for more accurate, secure and accessible information to enhance collaboration and support student achievement.

HP Sales and Marketing Collateral Management Solution provides sales and marketing teams with enhanced collaboration, automated content creation, centrally managed content re-use and support for mobile professionals utilizing multiple devices, including the HP Tablet PC.
HP Project Portfolio Management Solution offered with BrightWork, a provider of Web-based collaboration and work management software, provides a collaboration environment including a central place where project managers and their vendors and customers can access centralized, up-to-date information to manage multiple, large and small projects across an enterprise.

HP Collaboration Portal Solution builds on HP's leadership with SharePoint Products and Technologies to deliver highly available, highly scalable enterprise portals. HP has done extensive performance characterization and testing of this architecture on HP ProLiant servers.
HP Small Business Network Solution allows small businesses to quickly and easily benefit from server-based technology. HP ProLiant servers in combination with Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 offer an integrated solution featuring fully functioning collaboration, Intranet and remote access technology.
At the foundation of HP's Microsoft Office System solutions are infrastructure technologies featuring industry-leading HP ProLiant servers -- complete and capable industry- standard servers available for Microsoft environments. The platform of choice for Exchange, 54 percent of all Exchange implementations are deployed on HP ProLiant servers.

HP also announced the following new messaging and mobility services based on its expertise and leadership capabilities with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003:

HP Vision to Value Service allows business managers to participate in the design or redesign and deployment of a mission-critical enterprise-wide messaging system and ensure that it meets the needs of the business. With this offering, messaging is embedded into key business processes, automating the message to ensure that customers are served quickly and efficiently.
HP Review Service advises Exchange 2003 customers on ways to improve response time, availability and performance, and ensure a highly available IT infrastructure.
HP Mobility Pilot Deployment Service provides businesses a low-risk, pilot implementation and introduction to the benefits of mobility solutions based on the robust architecture of Exchange 2003. This service helps customers evaluate the advantages of an enterprise-messaging environment by designing and implementing a secure mobile pilot environment, documenting what's been done and training staff.
Customers benefit from HP solutions

The new Microsoft Office System, offering unprecedented levels of XML-based capabilities, enables development of flexible, comprehensive and integrated solutions. HP is already working with customers who have selected HP as their preferred partner for Microsoft Office System solutions and services. These customers include Lake Washington School District, Kirkland, Wash.; PGGM Insurance and Pension Fund Manager, The Netherlands; Tracy Unified School District, Tracy, Calif.; and Wolters Kluwer Health, New York City.

"HP has an impressive record in infrastructure and Web services solutions using Microsoft's technologies," said Joe Eschbach, corporate vice president of the Information Worker Product Management Group, Microsoft Corp. "With these new solutions and services, HP is building a strong foundation to help customers derive superior business value from the Microsoft Office System."

About HP

HP is a technology solutions provider to consumers, businesses and institutions globally. The company's offerings span IT infrastructure, personal computing and access devices, global services and imaging and printing for consumers, enterprises and small and medium businesses. For the last four quarters, HP revenue totaled $71.3 billion. More information about HP is available at www.hp.com.

This news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions. All statements other than statements of historical fact are statements that could be deemed forward-looking statements. Risks, uncertainties and assumptions include the possibility that the market for the sale of certain products and services may not develop as expected; that development and performance of these products and services may not proceed as planned; and other risks that are described from time to time in HP's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the period ended July 31, 2003 and HP's other Securities and Exchange Commission reports filed after HP's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended October 31, 2002. If any of these risks or uncertainties materializes or any of these assumptions proves incorrect, HP's results could differ materially from HP's expectations in these statements. HP assumes no obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements.

The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express warranty statements accompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.