With Pi buy, EMC fights Microsoft for space on the Internet cloud

Unlikely as it seems, Microsoft and storage vendor EMC Corp. are colliding on cloud computing. EMC today acquired Pi Corp., a start-up developing a novel form of PIM software. Along with the deal, EMC got a former Microsoft exec.

Microsoft's cloud computing initiative will be getting new and potentially powerful rivalry from EMC Corp. with buyout of the still somewhat mysterious software start-up Pi Corp., and the naming of Pi's founder -- former top Microsoft executive Paul Maritz -- as head of EMC's forthcoming Cloud Infrastructure and Services Division.

When the Pi buy is complete, Maritz will become president and general manager of EMC's new division, overseeing the development and operations of Pi along with other aspects of EMC's cloud computing strategy. That strategy calls for information to be stored on the Internet and accessed through Web browsers.

But what is Pi, anyway? On Pi Corp.'s Web site, Maritz writes that the start-up's software "will be available for pre-release testing soon."

Essentially, he explains, the software is designed to replace now outmoded approaches to authoring and managing documents -- such as folder, desktop, and drag-and-drop methaphors -- with new and "novel" techniques for searching, collecting, sharing and publishing the "thousands of items of personal information" that businesspeople must deal with everyday.

This personal informatiion includes e-mails, Web pages, contacts, pictures, and calendar items, for instance.

Pi's own strategy actually came by way of a kind of big-fish-swallows-littler-fish series of acquisitions, that started long before EMC ever came into the picture. Back in July 2006, Pi acquired a company called Smart Desktop. And along with that acquisition, Pi got a experienced software executive: former Autodesk executive John Forbes.

It was Forbes who helped launch the commercial end of a project Smart Desktop actually acquired, through the aid of a pair of researchers at Oregon State University named Dr. John Herlocker and Dr. Tom Dietterich, the latter of whom served as president of the International Machine Learning Association.

Herlocker's and Dietterich's pet project at Oregon State -- which is where this whole story actually begins -- is still going on, and is called TaskTracer. The university team describes the project as being founded on "the concept that almost all workers organize their work into discrete and describable units, such as projects, tasks or to-do items."

"Current desktop applications and tools were not built to support multi-tasking workers," reads the TaskTracer team's charter. "They assume that the set of tools and documents that you need to access remains consistent. However, when users are highly multitasking, the set of resources that they need may change rapidly -- every time the user's current task changes.

"In TaskTracer we envision a desktop environment that is task-aware, where applications known that users have tasks, each with different needs, and are aware of when task switches happen," the charter continues. "If an application is task-aware, it will know what files you are likely to open, what directory you are likely to need to save a file in, what people you may write e-mails to, and so on. Support for such task-aware activity could greatly boost productivity."

In a July 2006 interview with the University, Dr. Herlocker described using his team's software: "So when you need to switch to a different project, you can instantly bring up all that information associated with the project. This is going to revolutionize the way people and computers interact. Pi Corporation felt that this technology was so valuable they wanted not only to invest in it, but to own it."

Now, someone owns Pi. And today, Paul Maritz finds himself in the position of melding this unique university research initiative with EMC's strategy of driving users to its cloud computing services, which could create a new revenue stream from EMC storage.

A native of South Africa, Maritz worked at Microsoft between 1986 and 2000, serving as a member of the Executive Committee which manages that company. During various stints, he managed Microsoft's Systems Software (such as Windows 95, Windows NT, and Windows 2000), Development and Database Products; and Office and Exchange line-ups.

Aside from Pi, Maritz will now be in charge of all other elements of EMC's new "cloud" division, which is expected to include the Mozy online back-up service obtained through the company's $76 million purchase of Berkeley Data Systems, EMC's Fortress SaaS (software as a service) architecture, and other as yet unannounced EMC offerings now under development.

For its part, Microsoft began its long march into cloud computing in 2005. Its most recent project on a parallel course with EMC's strategy is Office Live Workspace, which melds Microsoft's online applications with parcels of leased, online storage space.

The latest editions of Office Live, introduced last November, include Internet storage components, new versions of Microsoft's Hotmail and Messenger communications services, and a new set of downloadable services for end users. Among the downloadable services are Windows Live Photo Gallery; Windows Live Mail; Windows Live Messenger 8.5; the Windows Live Writer blogging application; and Live OneCare Family Safety, a computer security offering.

If that name "Paul Maritz" rings a bell -- perhaps one that was lurking in the back of your mind, but whose sound has long since been...extinguished -- it's for good reason. It was Maritz' name which has repeatedly come up in the long, long antitrust investigation of Microsoft, particularly with regard to his tenure as VP of platforms.

Based on testimony such as this excerpt from the state of Iowa's own antitrust proceedings, it was Maritz who in his communications with collegues coined the phrase "embrace, extend, extinguish" as the unofficial Microsoft corporate strategy motto. During Microsoft's efforts to combat Netscape in the browser wars of the past decade, Maritz reportedly suggested that Microsoft make it its duty to "cut off their air supply."

It is Maritz who has been credited with the idea of extending the reach of Windows to encompass, and then eventually replace, both MS-DOS and OS/2. He is also credited with the notion, years before the release of Windows 95, of referring to Windows as being mated with MS-DOS in the future, in order to eliminate competition from DR DOS, an alternative OS produced at that time by Digital Research and later Caldera.