Zimbra just released v5.0. For those of you that don’t know Zimbra, it’s a Microsoft Exchange / Outlook competitor that Yahoo bought last year for $350m. While v5.0 looks nifty, I was thinking about the release notice to Zimbra customers for Zimbra v6.0, which I assume will be released after Microsoft completes their conquest acquisition of Yahoo (for those of you that live under a rock in a cave, Microsoft made an offer to acquire Yahoo last Friday for $45b.)
Following is an approximation of what I expect a Zimbra customer to receive regarding an upgrade.
Some date, 2010
Dear Microsoft Zimbra Customer:
The latest release of Zimbra (Zimbra 6.0) has been released to manufacturing today and will be available within 60 days. As part of this release, we are renaming Zimbra 6.0 to Microsoft Exchange Server 2010. The upgrade will be automatically delivered as part of your Zimbra license (sublicensed under the Microsoft Live Enterprise Support Service.)
If you are running the Zimbra desktop client, it will automatically be deleted and upgraded to Microsoft Outlook. If you are running the Zimbra Windows Mobile client, it will automatically be deleted and upgraded to Windows Mobile Mail. If you are running any of the other Zimbra clients, including ones for Palm, Symbian, iPhone, or Blackberry, they will simply stop working and you will need to upgrade to a Windows Mobile Device.
Please back up your data as we can not assure you that it will be transferred.