AOL to provide enterprise Instant Message services
With the potential for business use of instant messaging being as high as 200 million workers AOL is entering the arena with a more secure version of its popular IM service according to this New York Times story (registration required):
In all, about 75 million people were using instant messaging as of August, according to comScore Media Metrix. The vast majority do so at home. America Online's system has been immensely successful in the home market.
But workplace use is growing fast. About 17 million Americans currently use IM at work, up from 13 million a year ago, according to comScore. America Online holds the biggest share of the corporate market, too, with more than 10 million workplace users of AOL Instant Messenger. Microsoft Corp.'s MSN Messenger is No. 2 at the workplace, with 7.1 million users. Yahoo Inc.'s Yahoo Messenger has 5.5 million users. (Many users have more than one account.)
...AOL Instant Messenger will still be free. America Online will charge companies a list price of as much as $30 per user for security services and back-end software, which uses some FaceTime technology. Using the new service, companies can dole out instant-messaging "handles" -- like e-mail addresses -- to users, and archive IM conversations, just as they archive e-mail. Next year, America Online plans to launch a version that lets corporations encrypt instant messages as protection against hackers.