Three words sum up Microsoft's patent infringement suit against Salesforce.com: Competition by litigation. Microsoft knows plenty about competition by litigation, having been its victim through major antitrust cases on two continents. It's simply shameful action from a company which executies rightly wagged accusing fingers at litigating competitors over the years. Microsoft's "do unto them like they did unto us" approach cheapens the company. The proof is in the patents, which are hugely broad scope.

Qualifying that I am no patent attorney, I have applied layman's eyes to the patents that Microsoft alleges Salesforce.com violates. The nine patents read to me as being very broad in scope and potentially applicable to many forms of end user to computer or Web browser interactions -- or none at all. If any of these patents are enforceable, the US patent system really does need some reform.

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Last week, VMware and Salesforce.com announced a new partnership around VMforce, a Platform as a Service (PaaS) offering aimed at enterprise Java developers. The companies' CEOs Paul Maritz (VMware) and Marc Benioff (Salesforce) described VMforce as an enterprise cloud designed to serve the needs of more than six million enterprise Java developers, including some two million who are using the Spring framework VMware acquired last August when it purchased SpringSource.

According to Maritz and Benioff, by harnessing the VMforce cloud, enterprises and developers can dramatically simplify Java development "without compromising the flexibility, control and choice they require." In plain English, VMforce is a for-pay service whose cloud-based elements are designed to attract Java-loving enterprises and vendors.

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Today's rollout of a new customer relationship management application for Twitter follows Salesforce.com's already contentious announcement of its Facebook- and Google-enabled Service Cloud in January.

Known as Salesforce.com for Twitter, the new CRM application will work as a plug-in to Service Cloud, a cloud-based customer service channel that gives business workers access to Facebook connections, Google search, and other communications and discussion tools and forums.

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At an event this week described as "the Woodstock of developers conferences," Salesforce.com announced the new Force.com Sites hosted cloud environment and accompanying integration tools for Amazon and Facebook.

After first inventing itself as a premier SaaS (software as a service) practioner, Salesforce.com is now reinventing itself as a "cloud computing" company. This week, it's introducing a "PaaS" (platform as a service) hosted environment called Force.com Sites, along with new developers tools for Facebook front-end and Amazon back-end integration.

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Microsoft and Salesforce.com are at loggerheads over online CRM. Microsoft just rebranded its service and retooled its software, Salesforce is partnering with Google to parry Microsoft, and verbal attacks from both sides verge on vicious.

Why? As some analysts see it, software as a service (SaaS) opportunities have never been bigger anywhere than right now with CRM.

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Today, Google helped Salesforce.com pour more fuel onto the fire of its already heated rivalry with Microsoft's Dynamics CRM Online, a software-as-a-service product rebranded by Microsoft late last month.

Specifically, starting today, Salesforce.com's CRM Online service is tightly integrated with Google's online word processing, spreadsheet, and e-mail applications suite.

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In an effort to better compete with rival Microsoft, Google and Salesforce.com said Tuesday that they would collaborate on several services aimed at small business. The first is a web advertising collaboration where Salesforce.com customers can order ads from the company's website. Other collaborations could include integration with other Google products as well, sources told the Wall Street Journal.

Neither company will confirm that the moves are indeed aimed at taking on Microsoft head on, although Google's onine productivity applications could be combined with Salesforce.com's business applications to offer a comprehensive package for enterprise customers, some say.

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According to a report in Monday's Wall Street Journal Google is discussing an alliance with Salesforce.com, a provider of Web applications for businesses, in order to better compete with Microsoft when courting enterprise customers.

While Google has reigned supreme on the Web with consumers, businesses have been a harder sell, especially with the ubiquity of Microsoft's Office and server products. In turn, Google was rumored to be interested in acquiring Salesforce.com, but is now looking to a partnership that would integrate services from both companies. E-mail and IM from Google would join Salesforce.com's CRM tools in a single offering.

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