HANNOVER, Germany, March 3 /PRNewswire/ --

- Steve Ballmer discusses environmental sustainability efforts from
Microsoft and general availability of enterprise products.

Today at CeBIT 2008, Microsoft Corp CEO Steve Ballmer discussed company
efforts for information technology (IT) and the protection of the
environment, and delivered news about the next step in Microsoft's software
plus services vision for more innovation in communication and collaboration.
Looking at the power of software to have an impact on environmental issues
including climate change, Microsoft announced a cooperative agreement with
Yello Strom, a Cologne-based electricity supplier, to help people better
understand what their electricity is being used for at home, and ecoDrive, a
solution that Fiat Group Automobiles will deploy to improve environmentally
friendly driving. For the enterprise, Ballmer announced the general
availability of the freely downloadable Microsoft Search Server 2008 Express 
and Silverlight Blueprint for SharePoint. In addition, he announced the 
expansion of Microsoft Online Services for businesses of all sizes with 
Microsoft Exchange Online and Microsoft SharePoint Online entering a limited 
beta trial.

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Yello and Microsoft unveiled the Yello Sparzahler (Yello savings meter),
which transfers power-consumption data from customers' home electricity meter
to their computer with a handy Windows Vista gadget. The Yello savings meter
can show customers how much electricity the refrigerator, the microwave or
the home theatre system is using. With the Yello savings meter, people can
keep a watchful eye on their home energy use - and the corresponding cost -
and can check up on their energy consumption even when they are not at home,
simply by logging onto the Yello website. Martin Vesper, managing director of
Yello, demonstrated the application.

"With the decision to use Microsoft technology to create our online
savings meter and the IT structure behind it, we chose a future-oriented
solution for our company and our customers," Vesper said.

"We're focused on reducing computer power consumption and on finding new
ways to use software and information technology to help protect the
environment by enabling people to use energy more efficiently in every aspect
of our lives," Ballmer said.

Environmental Sustainability

Achim Berg, general manager of Microsoft Germany, also participated in
the presentation and announced new advances for the automotive sector,
highlighting ecoDrive, a solution that Fiat will deploy to analyse a
motorist's driving style and recommend a more environmentally friendly way to
drive. The system is built on Blue&Me technology, already used by Fiat, which
allows drivers to operate devices such as an MP3 player, a Smartphone or a
navigation system by voice control. A Fiat 500 equipped with this technology
can be seen at the main booth A26 in Hall 4.

Microsoft is focusing an increasing amount of resources towards helping
to improve the environment through software and technology innovation.
Ballmer announced that the company would be releasing its data centre best
practices to help others in the industry learn from Microsoft's experience
running large data centres around the world. The best practices will be made
available on Microsoft's website and will detail information on site
selection for clean and renewable power, space optimisation, and
manageability to ensure efficiency of data centre services and
infrastructure, and power prioritisation tactics for choosing servers and
equipment that draw less power and produce less heat. By following the best
practices announced today, Microsoft data centres such as the one recently
announced in Dublin, Ireland, will consume less than half the energy of
similar-sized data centres that were built just three years ago.

New Products

Ballmer also announced continued delivery of key parts of Microsoft's
software plus services strategy with the news that Exchange Online and
SharePoint Online, initially announced in September for worldwide businesses
with more than 5,000 users, will soon be available to businesses of all
sizes. Today, these services will be made available to American companies in
a limited beta trial. The services are expected to be made generally
available to businesses of all sizes in the second half of 2008.

The general availability of free software for enterprise search,
Microsoft Search Server 2008 Express, was also announced. The server,
introduced last fall, is a powerful solution designed to identify employee
competencies in a company as easily as documents stored on a network. Search
Server 2008 Express addresses the increasing requirement for enterprises to
be able to find and share information across their organisations and
demonstrates Microsoft's end-to-end approach to delivering enterprise search.
The news adds to momentum created by Microsoft's recent offer to acquire
Norwegian company Fast Search & Transfer ASA to enable users to deal with a
single vendor for a variety of search options. The Silverlight Blueprint for
SharePoint, now available, offers support for the development of flexible
internet applications, combining the possibilities provided by web
technologies with extensive interactivity functions. The Blueprint contains
examples of use, detailed guidelines, best practices and the visualisation of
business data.

Ballmer also gave an overview of the latest products from Microsoft,
including Windows Server 2008, Microsoft SQL Server 2008 and Visual Studio
2008, which launched last week.

About Microsoft Deutschland GmbH

Microsoft Deutschland GmbH was founded in 1983 and is a subsidiary of
Microsoft Corp, the world's largest producer of standard software, services
and solutions. In addition to the corporate headquarters in 
Unterschleissheim, near Munich, Microsoft Deutschland GmbH operates six 
regional offices in Germany and employs more than 2,200 people. Within a
network of about 33,000 partner companies, Microsoft supports businesses from
all industries and of any size. In May 2003, the European Microsoft
Innovation Center (EMIC) was opened in Aachen with the focus on the research
areas of IT security, data protection, mobility, mobile applications and web
services.

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is the worldwide leader in
software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realise
their full potential.

About Microsoft EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa)

Microsoft has operated in EMEA since 1982. In the region Microsoft
employs more than 16,000 people in over 64 subsidiaries, delivering products
and services in more than 139 countries and territories.

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