ARMONK, NY--(MARKET WIRE)--Mar 7, 2008 -- IBM (NYSE:IBM - News) today announced that its unified communications and collaboration platform, IBM Lotus Sametime, has been named the 2008 North American Enterprise Product of the Year by leading global growth consulting company Frost & Sullivan.

The Frost & Sullivan Award for Product of the Year is presented to the company that demonstrates excellence in new product development and launch within its industry. Products are assessed based on their competitive advantage, significance to the marketplace and uniqueness of features and capabilities.

"IBM Lotus came out swinging with its Sametime unified communications and collaboration product suite," said Melanie Turek, Frost & Sullivan. "One of the key things that makes Sametime standout from competitors is that it supports multi-vendor environments, which are the norm for most mid- and large-size organizations today."

Network World also recognized Lotus Sametime software by awarding it the 2008 Best of the Tests award for Converged Collaboration. The 2008 Best of the Tests Awards are bestowed by Network World upon select products that registered the top performance spots in its hands-on testing program during 2007. Products were assessed based on performance, feature functionality and ease of use. Lotus Sametime software received the highest score of the 170 products considered for the 2008 awards.

Lotus Sametime is a family of products that delivers unified communications and collaboration capabilities to businesses of all sizes. For more information on Lotus Sametime: www.ibm.com/lotus/sametime

For more information about Frost & Sullivan's Best Practices Awards, visit www.awards.frost.com.

For more information on the 2008 Best of the Tests Products visit: http://www.networkworld.com/bestproducts/2008/.

IBM, Lotus, and Sametime are trademarks of IBM Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.

     Contact:
     Erica Topolski
     IBM Software Group
     +1-617-693-2816
     ericat@us.ibm.com