Microsoft Launches MapPoint.Net

Microsoft

MapPoint.Net is designed to allow solution providers to quickly and easily integrate mapping and location technology into customers' public Web applications, business productivity applications and enterprise solutions.

"With MapPoint.Net, location becomes an ingredient of a software solution and functions within the context of whatever work people are doing to help them gain insight into business productivity and efficiency," said Michael Graff, general manager of the MapPoint business unit at Microsoft, in a prepared statement.

MapPoint, a SOAP/XML Web service that will be hosted by Microsoft, will be available through a number of different pricing models. As a subscription service, solution providers subscribe to the basic Web service and pay a platform access fee and per user license.

Through the service-level agreement (SLA) model, solution providers sign a one year SLA with Microsoft and each request-response to the service is considered a transaction. MapPoint Alliance Partners, meanwhile, may purchase access to the service through the ISV product integration pricing model.