SharePoint & Lotus

Champion Solutions Group is a premier technology solutions provider and long-time Lotus Notes/Domino customer. Recently, the company completed an enterprise-wide MOSS deployment in order to deliver a portal that provides Web-based document management, team sites, and integration with back-end Microsoft SQL-based applications. The company is deploying Mainsoft SharePoint Integrator to integrate SharePoint with Lotus Notes 8.0.2.

 
I recently spoke to CTO Bill Phelps about his decision to integrate the two platforms: "We already have a unified communications infrastructure in place that's fully integrated with our business processes, and we didn't see a compelling reason to migrate to a single vendor in order to unify messaging and collaboration platforms. Mainsoft offers the practical integration path we need to support our end users' preferred platforms while preserving our existing IT investments."
 
To date, Champion Solutions Group has deployed four SharePoint sites, and they're in the process of deploying a fifth one. The largest site automates document notifications and approvals as part of the sales process and allows the sales team to store Lotus Notes emails as part of the sales documents on SharePoint.
 
Mr. Phelps also shared his feedback regarding the benefits of the integration: "Everyone using Mainsoft SharePoint Integrator likes it a lot. Engineers, who were satisfied with accessing SharePoint from a Web interface, think Mainsoft SharePoint Integrator is a lot of added value."
 
"The real value is convincing business users to adopt SharePoint, now that they have drag-and-drop access to shared documents from their Lotus Notes email application. Also, our sales team is seeing the immediate value of storing emails on SharePoint. Everyone can stay informed of the sales process, without team members having to CC everyone at every step, and they can later retrace the process, as needed."
 
Next up? An upgrade to Lotus Notes 8.5, calendar integration, and SharePoint access from Lotus Sametime.