BizAutomation.com, developer of web based CRM and business management software for small businesses, announced it has launched the industry’s first all-in-one e-business suite for organizations that run on Microsoft Exchange. BizAutomation.com’s BizAutomation CRM + Business Management, will be available as both a licensed product–sold directly to businesses at $399.95 USD per user–and as a hosted product that Exchange ASPs can offer their subscribers through their hosted Exchange services. It also includes integration with QuickBooks, which accounts for roughly 85% of small businesses that use accounting software in the U.S. BizAutomation CRM + Business Management features Web based CRM, Web Based ERP, e-Projects & Fulfillment, Business Portal, Email Alerts, and much more.

Microsoft will spend $500 million this year to promote upcoming products designed to make business workers more productive, CEO Steve Ballmer said Thursday. Software due to arrive over the next year will cater to information workers in corporations, he told an audience at a Microsoft-organized customer event. The event was specifically targeted at business executives, such as CEOs, rather than IT workers or developers.

CEO Steve Ballmer and Jeff Raikes, president of Microsoft’s Business Division, outlined the company’s vision for what it calls "People-Ready Business." It’s the first time the company has spoken publicly about its evolved vision for business and how it plans to communicate it. To learn more about People-Ready Business, what is driving this vision and what it means for customers, partners and the industry, PressPass spoke with Raikes, the executive owner for the People-Ready vision.

Microsoft released the first Community Technology Preview of Service Pack 1 for its widely-used SQL Server database. SQL Server 2005 Service Pack 1 will feature data-mirroring technology, functionality that Microsoft cut at the last minute from SQL Server 2005 due to customer quality concerns. The SP also includes SQL Server Management Studio Express, a front-end graphical tool for the Express version of Microsoft’s database.

A former security guard at General Motors’ Warren technical center is accused of taking employee Social Security numbers and using them to hack into the company’s employee vehicle database. James S. Green II, 35, of Washington Township, found out what company cars the employees drove and sent them bogus emails asking them their thoughts on the vehicles. Green was arraigned Monday on eight counts of obtaining, possessing or transferring personal identity information, one count of using a computer to commit a crime and one count of stalking that was unrelated to the GM cases. He was released after posting 10 percent of a $50,000 bond.

In an effort to cut down on pirated software being sold online, Microsoft has filed eight lawsuits against eBay auction sellers who allegedly have sold counterfeit applications. The sellers were located in eight different states, including Arizona, Washington, and Hawaii. Microsoft traced most of the pirates through its online validation program, Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA). Some of the defendants were reported to the company’s antipiracy hotline.

Bill Gates sketched out a vision for the future Wednesday in which a cell phone will become a "digital wallet," able to receive e-mail and even scan business cards, while computers and TVs will merge. Microsoft Corp., the world’s largest software maker, also wants to "redefine the way that citizens think about how they work with government and how efficient communication takes place," Gates told about 300 political, business and academic leaders from Canada, Latin America and the United States at the company’s Government Leaders Forum.

Microsoft is adding operational business intelligence capabilities to its Microsoft Dynamics SL applications, the company said Wednesday. The software, called BIO for business intelligence optimization, will provide reports and performance scorecards designed for 14 organizational roles, ranging from CEO and CFO to operational managers, in small and midsized businesses. Users will be able to view the reports using Microsoft Office applications such as Excel, SharePoint Services, and Business Scorecard Manager, as well as directly through the BIO for Microsoft Dynamics SL application, previously known as Microsoft Business Solutions-Solomon.

Beta testing has been the cornerstone of the software development process for Microsoft and most other commercial software makers for as long as they’ve been writing software. But if certain powers-that-be in Redmond, Wash., have their way, betas may soon be a thing of the past for Microsoft, its partners and its customers. Beta builds are predictable milestones by which external and internal testers have measured their progress toward the delivery of final code. But in the last year or so top Microsoft brass have been wondering aloud whether big-bang betas are the best way to develop and test software.

Microsoft is building into the new operating system a tool that will rate a PC based on how well it is running and on how much it can take advantage of Vista’s capabilities. The ##"Windows Performance Rating,"## which can be seen in the latest test version of the operating system, evaluates components such as the processor, the memory, the hard drive and graphics cards to come up with an overall score. The rating appears in a large blue circle and can be seen in multiple places in the operating system, though Microsoft has said little about what exactly the rating signifies. The main rating is on a scale of 1 to 5, but individual components are also given a "sub rating" on some other, unspecified range. "The idea behind the Windows Performance Rating is to help average consumers easily understand their Windows Vista PC’s overall performance, and to simplify the process of determining whether certain software applications will run smoothly based on their system components," Microsoft said in a statement provided to CNET News.com.