Pronet Soft, a software consulting firm, makes it a practice to take immediate advantage of technology advancements. The firm undertook a pilot deployment of the Windows® 7 operating system and experienced a fast, straightforward implementation with no compatibility issues. Pronet Soft has found that Windows 7 offers an enhanced user experience and easier system management than previous versions because of the wealth of new tools it includes.

Operated by Dublin, Ireland–based Digital Minds, Zignals empowers investors with free, online investment tools that incorporate real-time communication and collaborative features. Zignals wanted to develop an interactive Web interface for its application built on the Microsoft® .NET Framework. The company chose Microsoft Silverlight™, a cross-platform, cross-browser plug-in for developing rich Internet applications, over Adobe Flash. Zignals took advantage of Silverlight to create a uniquely compelling experience in a Web-based application that behaves like a desktop application. By using Silverlight, Zignals reused more code, load-balanced resources across projects, and quickly adjusted its application to meet the needs of clients.

Japan-based, high-tech manufacturer TDK-Lambda designs, manufactures, and distributes power-supply components. The custom Web interface for the company’s business intelligence application was slow and confusing for many employees, which resulted in poor usage. TDK-Lambda developed a revolutionary, new interface by using Microsoft® Silverlight™, a cross-platform, cross-browser plug-in, that enables line-of-business (LOB) Web applications to perform like desktop applications. Today, the Silverlight-based LOB application provides more than 90 charts that meet the company’s reporting needs for manufacturing, inventory, financial management, and sales, providing an experience that is radically different from a traditional LOB application. The new Silverlight-based interface has helped improve usage rates and has become a catalyst for the creation of a new business culture.

Headquartered in Dubai, netlinkblue is the media technology and services firm that won the online broadcasting rights to the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket season. The company wanted to pursue an advertiser-supported model and needed to attract the largest possible audience of cricket fans from around the world. netlinkblue used the ubiquity of the Microsoft® Silverlight™ browser plug-in to stream cricket matches to fans regardless of their browser or connection speed. Fans could follow matches in near-real time, with advanced features such as picture-in-picture displays of game highlights and interactive activities including chat, voting, and updated profiles of teams and players. At the end of the IPL season, netlinkblue had served nearly 200 million page views—three times more than the previous season.

A charter of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is to educate the public and inspire students. NASA hosts a Web site for the purpose of generating public awareness about the Mars Science Laboratory rover known as Curiosity. The Mars team wanted to add even greater interactivity to let people explore the new rover and to give them a realistic feeling of the rover’s scale and testing environment. NASA worked with Microsoft to create an online three-dimensional view of a full-scale model of Curiosity by using Microsoft® Photosynth™ technology and Microsoft Silverlight™, the cross-browser plug-in. Now, by using Silverlight, NASA can let the public explore the new Mars Science Laboratory and generate greater awareness about the project, while enabling people to enjoy virtual experiences that bring the universe to their desktops.

The University of Miami (UM) is one of the leading research universities in the United States. With a server infrastructure that exceeded its facility’s capacity and required the use of valuable resources to administer, the 10 IT staff in UM’s enterprise Windows server group needed to consolidate servers and streamline management. Now it is running Windows Server® 2008 with Hyper-V™, migrating VMware Server and Microsoft® Virtual Server 2005 to the Hyper-V technology, and using Microsoft System Center products to manage, monitor, and back up its environment. As a result, UM cut data center space and power requirements, realized 80 percent savings in energy costs compared to its previous nonvirtualized environment, enhanced utilization of physical servers, slashed virtual server deployment time from hours to minutes, and enabled a more robust disaster recovery plan.

Kimberly-Clark wanted to integrate its MyKleenexTissue.com site with the rest of its infrastructure to lower costs and boost marketing. The company redeveloped the site using Microsoft® Silverlight™, Microsoft Commerce Server 2007, and the Microsoft .NET Framework. Kimberly-Clark expects to save up to 40 percent annually in IT costs and develop stronger customer connections with a Web environment that can flex to meet future needs.

Continental Airlines stands out from its competition through a commitment to superior customer service and a forward-thinking approach to technology. When it came time to update its call center reservations system, Continental and its partner Infusion Development chose the Microsoft® Silverlight™ browser plug-in to build the new reservations solution as a rich Internet application. The new system provides improved functionality and workflow for call center agents, which enables them to deliver better customer service and satisfaction. With the new solution, Continental saves money by consolidating servers and databases that currently sit in call centers around the world. By choosing Silverlight, the company also has reduced development and deployment time, simplified application management, and made it easy to integrate the new system with Continental’s existing Web services.

Horn IT Solutions is Whitby, Ontario-based IT professional services and consulting firm committed to helping Canadian companies achieve greater business growth. As a Microsoft® Gold Certified partner, Horn IT is leveraging strategic and marketing resources, which includes a dedicated Microsoft partner account manager (PAM) and deeper insight into Windows®-based technology roadmaps. The Gold Certified partner status is also helping the company develop its software product portfolio, grow its customer base and boost its profile. Based on recent achievements, Horn IT Solutions was a winner of the 2008 Impact Awards, which recognizes excellence across the large and diverse community of Microsoft Canada technology partners, for the company’s commitment to developing advanced infrastructure IT solutions on the Windows operating system.

R Systems provides flexible high-performance computing (HPC) resources for academic researchers and commercial organizations. The company offers traditional Linux clusters as well as clusters that run on the Windows® HPC Server 2008 operating system. By making Windows HPC Server available, R Systems increases productivity for its customers by using the best operating system for their particular research applications.