PeopleSoft harnesses AOL IM

PeopleSoft and America Online on Tuesday announced that they would integrate AOL's instant messaging service into PeopleSoft's business applications to enhance real-time collaboration for corporate users.

PeopleSoft's products, ranging from its customer relationship management (CRM) software to its supply chain management applications, will have IM capabilities through AOL Enterprise AIM services. The capabilities are available now through PeopleSoft's PeopleTools 8.43.

PeopleSoft has been increasingly adding IM capabilities to its business applications as a way for companies to communicate in real time and more effectively with other employees, their customers, suppliers and partners.

This spring, the company said it would harness IM features from IBM's Lotus Sametime technology for presence detection, Microsoft's real-time communication server called Greenwich and Yahoo's Messenger Enterprise Edition.

That announcement, however, shut out AOL Instant Messenger (AIM)--one of the largest IM networks. AIM delivers more than a billion messages a day, the company said.

"AIM extends customer choice and increases the value of PeopleSoft enterprise applications by adding immediacy to the business process enabling users to communicate in real-time", Rick Bergquist, PeopleSoft's chief technology officer, said in a statement.

IM has evolved from a teenage fad to a communications tool in businesses. Initially, employees often used it without the consent of their company's IT managers, finding IM more effective than e-mail for quick interactions.

Technology giants such as IBM, Oracle, Sun Microsystems and Microsoft are latching onto the exploding popularity of IM in the corporate world by adding IM capabilities to their collaborative applications.