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IBM has announced a mashup integration that fits Cognos Business Intelligence with a new version of the company's Mashup Center. The two services fit together to create an environment that leverages IBM's existing technology base with a service that's right out of a play book for social computing.

It's a small move for IBM but demonstrates that the company is thinking strategically about how to leverage its strengths in business intelligence and analytics. At the same time it shows how IBM is adopting new ways for users to communicate more effectively with multiples sources of information.

IBM is developing analytics platforms to help companies better understand how multiple pieces of information fit together to create rich forms of business intelligence.

We sat down today at the IBM Information on Demand Conference with Jeff Jonas, one of IBM's chief scientists to get a picture of the types of analysis they see emerging for users.

Business intelligence, analytics and the demand for process optimization are the big draws here at the IBM Information On Demand Conference in Las Vegas.

As one executive said on stage, its not enough to react quickly to what is happening but to predict it.

Salesforce.com and Adobe have entered a partnership that allows developers to create rich Internet and desktop applications in the cloud. The partnership is just one more example of how an ecosystem is developing between Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) vendors and application developers.

In recent weeks Salesforce.com has partnered with a host of companies, including Box.net last week and an integration with Cisco earlier this month.

The small business market is seeing a new crop of customer relationship management and intranet applications designed to provide a basic set of features without overwhelming the user. GlassCubes is an example of the type of companies entering this space, providing tools that the average sales person can begin using with little or no training.

GlassCubes is a London-based company that launched last Fall. They now have about 250 customers. A good number of their users are companies that migrated from British Telecom Workspace, which has discontinued its contact management and collaboration product. GlassCubes has teamed up with the telecom provider to help users make the switch.

An all-star team is forming at StatusNet, the open microblogging service for businesses and communities. The newest addition is Jon Phillips, former community and business development manager for Creative Commons.

Phillips joins Brion Vibber, who came from the Wikimedia Foundation where he served as chief technology officer.

In the world of Software-as-a-Service, you can start to see how platforms will evolve into service networks - where enterprise users may subscribe and get access to applications that they pay for on a per use basis.

Today, Box.net announced a partnership with Salesforce.com CRM that shows this developing model.

We write a lot about the battles for the enterprise, the merits of Sharepoint and Google's pitches into the corporate world.

But it's always good to watch the new players who use existing open-source software to build something pretty quickly that people can use. OfficeMedium is a service that is a fit for the small business user with just enough social features to give it a decent chance of winning over companies looking to establish a community platform for their users.

Wikis, micro-blogs and collaboration technologies get a lot of attention for their use in the enterprise but one need remains constant.

Search.

Who wins the search battle will come home with a lot of prizes and big wins in the enterprise. Search may even prove to be a differentiation for companies that are choosing collaboration platforms.

RightSignature, the company that allows you to sign with a mouse, is making a play to serve as a core integration for the Software-as-a-Service market.

It's a trend we expect to see more from third-party providers that seek to establish anchor positions as agnostic tools for Salesforce.com and vertically oriented SaaS services.