Microsoft to launch Centro to boost midmarket infrastructure

Microsoft is set to address the needs of the midmarket by means of Centro - a product that will bundle together Longhorn Server, the next version of Exchange and the next generation of security technologies. Due for release in 2007 as part of the "Longhorn" wave of products, Centro will be available as an out-of-box solution, and will run on between two and three servers, apparently. With Centro, users will be walked through the stages of system admin tasks - such as adding a new user account and adding it to several groups, which currently requires using several tools - by means of a wizard, reducing such operations to just a few easy steps. The aim of Centro is to keep it simple - to make things easy for admins in the midmarket area.

"We are working very hard on making sure that the installation and set up is as automated and simplified as much as possible. Once it is up and running, users will have a management experience that ties the different applications together," Steven VanRoekel, Microsoft's director of midmarket solutions in the Windows Server group said.