REDMOND, Washington, September 4 /PRNewswire/ --

- Significant participation by National Bodies in ISO/IEC ratification
process for Open XML; final decision expected in March 2008 at close of
ballot resolution period.

Today the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) released
the results of the preliminary ballot to participating National Body members
for the ISO/IEC DIS 29500 (Ecma 376 Office Open XML file formats)
ratification process. The results show that 51 ISO members, representing 
74 percent of all qualified votes, stated their support for ratification of 
Open XML. Along with their votes, the National Bodies also provided 
invaluable technical comments designed to improve the specification. Many of 
the remaining ISO members stated that they will support Open XML after their
comments are addressed during the final phase of the process, which is
expected to close in March 2008.

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With at least 87 countries taking part in some way, the Open XML review
represents an unprecedented level of participation in the standardization of
a document format. Fifty-one ISO members voicing support at this preliminary
stage of the process compares favorably with the 32 ISO members supporting
Open Document Format (ODF) 1.0 at the end of its process and the 15 ISO
members supporting PDF/A-1 at the end of its process. This widespread
participation and support is consistent with the rapid adoption of the Ecma
Office Open XML file formats across multiple platforms and products from a
wide range of IT vendors (including Apple, Novell, Corel, Sun, Microsoft,
Java developers and Linux distributors), creating real value for IT users
around the globe.

"We are extremely delighted to see that 51 ISO members, representing 
74 percent of the qualified votes, have already voiced their support for ISO
ratification of Open XML, and that many others have indicated they will
support ratification once their comments are resolved in the next phase of
the ISO process," said Tom Robertson, general manager for Interoperability
and Standards at Microsoft Corp. "This preliminary vote is a milestone for
the widespread adoption of the Open XML formats around the world for the
benefit of millions of customers. Given how encouraging today's results were,
we believe that the final tally in early 2008 will result in the ratification
of Open XML as an ISO standard."

Technical Input Will Enhance the Standard

Today's results represent the beginning of the third phase of the ISO/IEC
process, called "ballot resolution," during which time Ecma International
will respond to all comments that have been submitted by ISO National Bodies
and provide them with a final opportunity to voice their support.

"Technical experts around the world have provided invaluable feedback and
technical recommendations for evolving the format," Robertson said. "The high
quality of the Open XML format will be improved as a result of this process,
and we take seriously our role in working within the Ecma technical committee
to address the comments received. We believe that the ISO National Bodies
will be pleased with the results."

The ISO/IEC process is also designed to create maximum opportunities for
ISO members to move from "no" to "yes" in this final phase, and we fully
expect the total number of supporting votes to grow. "The objective of the 
standardization process, whether with Ecma International, ISO/IEC or another 
standards body, is ultimately to refine a specification and achieve a 
positive consensus around its formal adoption for the benefit of the entire 
industry," said Hugo Lueders, group director of EU Public Policy for the 
Computer Industry Technology Association. "Given the remarkable level of 
participation from the global standards community, the results from this 
preliminary ballot are very encouraging."

Although no date has been formally set, the final tally is likely to take
place in March 2008. ISO/IEC requires that at least 75 percent of all "yes"
or "no" votes (qualified votes) and at least two-thirds of "P" members that
vote "yes" or "no" support ratification of a format in the Fast Track
process. More information about the ISO/IEC JTC-1 process and its
participants is available at
http://www.iso.org/iso/standards_development/processes_and_procedures/iso_iec
_directives_and_iso_supplement.htm.
(Due to length of the URL please cut and paste into browser)

Widespread Support for Open XML

The Ecma Office Open XML file formats are being rapidly adopted across
multiple platforms and products from a wide range of IT vendors, creating
real value for IT users around the globe. Thousands of companies from 67
countries on six continents have raised their voices in support of Open XML
and its ratification by ISO/IEC at http://www.openxmlcommunity.org. As well,
the open standard has also been gaining broad adoption across the software
industry for use on a variety of platforms - including Linux, Windows(R), Mac
OS and the Palm OS. Independent software vendors (ISVs) and platform
providers around the world - such as Apple, Corel, Sun, Microsoft and Novell
- are developing solutions using Open XML. Many developers working with the
formats are active contributors to http://www.openxmldeveloper.org.

Those working with Open XML can attest to the benefits of this open file
format in the areas of file and data management, data recovery,
interoperability with line-of-business systems, and the long-term
preservation of documents. Open XML is optimized for the level of precision
and detail that facilitates carrying forward billions of existing files. As
well, Open XML file formats are uniquely capable of integrating other types
of systems and data with Open XML documents, while maintaining a clean,
simple separation of presentation (Open XML markup) and data (custom schemas
and instances thereof). This means that organizations can use Open XML
formats to report information from other applications and systems without
having to translate it first, which is a key innovation for developers
seeking to incorporate real-time business information into their documents,
or those who seek to "tag" documents with their own categorization system to
improve their understanding of its contents.

More information about Open XML, as well as available solutions using the
open standard specification, is available at
http://www.openxmlcommunity.org/momentum.aspx#technology.

Commitment to Interoperability

The Open XML Translator 
(http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/odf-converter) is one among many
interoperability projects Microsoft has undertaken. We continue to work with
customers and others in the industry to address the critical interoperability
issues of our customers through the delivery of products that are
interoperable by design, collaboration on interoperability projects,
providing access to interoperability technologies, and standardization. Other
evidence of collaboration includes our technical collaborations with AOL LLC
and Yahoo! Inc. for instant messaging interoperability, the broad
collaboration with Novell on virtualization, document formats and
intellectual property, and the creation of the Interoperability Vendor
Alliance. More information is available at http://www.microsoft.com/interop.

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is the worldwide leader in
software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize
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