Tidal Software Announces New Automation Product for Microsoft Exchange Server at Microsoft Management Summit 2008

Market Wire, April, 2008

MICROSOFT MANAGEMENT SUMMIT -- Tidal Software, a leading provider of application scheduling and performance management software, today announced Tidal(TM) Intelligent Automation(TM) for Microsoft Exchange Server at the Microsoft Management Summit. The product enables IT to comprehensively automate Exchange Server management processes, ensuring that administrative processes are executed consistently, administrative access is managed securely, and corporate policies are adhered to consistently. These automated processes also assist in executing the diagnostic steps needed to quickly identify the source and nature of any technical problems impacting Exchange Server performance, localizing problems within the supporting software, hardware, or third party products supporting an Exchange Server environment. Intelligent Automation for Microsoft Exchange Server supports SCOM 2007, providing an easy way to automate the response to problems identified by the SCOM 2007 Management Pack for Exchange Management Server.

Tidal Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server simplifies many of the common administration processes needed to manage an Exchange Server environment. While an IT team could automate these functions through scripting, the resulting automated processes would not offer any policy-based controls, auditing, or management of administrative privileges. Tidal Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server also helps to identify problems with email and related tools that can often be misattributed to Exchange Server, problems that in fact more often originate in the client, network, operating environment, third party tools, or in one of the many other components in a complete Exchange Server environment. Tidal provides a rapid way for help desk and administrators to automate administration processes through a graphical interface, and quickly pinpoint problem sources.

"Increasingly, messaging infrastructure is becoming a central platform for business. Business process continuity, corporate compliance, and information security are all dependent on a properly functioning messaging platform," said David Williams, Research VP at Gartner. "Solutions that assist in automating the administrative and operational processes surrounding these platforms will play a vital role in ensuring not just the availability and service level management of the messaging platform, but its ability to fulfill these business critical functions."

Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server allows Exchange Server administration teams to:

--  Avoid operational and policy errors and prove adherence for
    compliance: allows IT to reduce risks presented to the enterprise when
    policies are not tightly aligned with processes.
--  Build custom automation for administration without scripting: saves
    time, but also allows processes to be changed quickly, and be understood
    easily across the team in the future.
--  Coordinate with other groups supporting the Exchange Server
    environment: Windows, Active Directory, DNS, and IIS administration play a
    crucial role and Intelligent Automation increases cross organization
    efficiency, ensuring availability and service level delivery.
--  Quickly get needed information to troubleshoot issues: improves
    resolution time, increasing both IT and business productivity.
    

The solution is built on a rich application automation and performance management foundation and includes a combination of visual and analytic capabilities that combine to simplify the automation of processes that incorporate and support business rules.

Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server Product Details:

Migration to Exchange Server 2007 -- Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server provides a sophisticated worflow process to migrate users from Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 to Exchange Server 2007. It runs automatically, allowing migration activity to run automatically on off hours such as evenings and weekends while email usage is minimal and can be stopped and started until all mailboxes are migrated. The migration process can automatically decommission the old Exchange Server when complete. The process is completely visible and can be easily taylored to meet user timeframes and migration policy requirements.

Standardized management processes for Exchange Server 2007 -- Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server reduces the learning curve for administrators as they move to Exchange Server 2007 by automating a range of standard management processes. It offers either full automation where no administrator intervention is required, or guided operations in which the process proposes options to the administrator and obtains concurrence before proceeding. Many processes in IT require management approvals before changes are implemented, and Intelligent Automation for Exchange Server can require and manage approvals at any step in a process. To support regulatory compliance, it logs all requests for approvals and the approvals themselves.