http://www.microsoft.com/infoserv/intranet.htm (PC Press Internet CD, 03/1996)

Microsoft Powers Mission-Critical Solutions on the Intranet with BackOffice

Not only is Netscape several times slower than Microsoft servers, but strapping together misleading press releases for future Beta code fails to deliver the cost-effective solution customers demand on the Intranet

What are customers really asking for in an Intranet platform?

Publish information to more people in your organization or workgroup better and faster than ever before
A platform to drive line-of-business solutions
An integrated suite of tools
Extend their Information Technology investment onto the Web
Support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, around the world

In a single package BackOffice delivers everything you need to run your business on the Intranet, including:

Scalable and reliable Intranet file and print services with Windows NT Server
A Web Server that is a natural extension of the operating system itself with the high-performance Internet Information Server. And everyone can now share their own information from their desktop with peer web services on Windows 95 and Windows NT Workstation in addition to Windows NT Server
Mail server with integrated groupware that makes it easier to communicate over the Intranet
Microsoft SQL Server, the first high performance Intranet database server designed specifically for the new world of distributed client/server computing
Microsoft SNA Server is the most reliable and flexible gateway to extend your mainframe or AS/400 investment to the Intranet
The most effective multi-Website management system that provides integrated desktop management for customers with medium to large Intranets
The most extensible platform available with the widest array of development tools.

There are some key facts to recall when reading the Netscape announcements. For example, SuiteSpot:

Is not shipping
Does not have, and has yet to announce a truly integrated, full-featured solutions suite
Is only a marketing bundle of proposed Internet product plans
Contains no single best-of-breed application
Fails to integrate with the existing Information Technology
Requires vast new investments in product, training, support structures and integration … all with no apparent net benefit

Netscape Publishes Factually Erroneous Information

Netscape Claim	Reality Check
Netscape is an open platform	Netscape's APIs are unique to their platform and closed to industry comment. What's more NSAPI is not even supported across all their servers!
Netscape servers are fast	Not when compared to Microsoft. It takes several dozen expensive, proprietary servers to run their site.
Netscape products are reliable	PC Week is running a conversation on unsafe Netscape products. Moreover, they also reported that, "Instability [was] observed when testing with high numbers of clients"
Netscape is secure	To the contrary … users cannot even log on to a Netscape server without sending the password over the network in clear text. Hardly a secure solution. Moreover there is an absolute absence of tools for managing security across multiple Web servers on a large Intranet All user account databases are managed one at a time, which means extra personnel for the IT department Users will have to memorize multiple id's and password to use all the servers in a Netscape solution. An inherently insecure proposal
Netscape is inexpensive	Netscape is over-priced for what is delivered (someday) They forgot that Intranets need a real database that can support hundreds or thousands of users. A 'developers runtime' database limited to a few sessions is woefully inadequate The Netscape development world is limited to a C++ derivative, which although useful for some applications, is hardly an empowering approach for the masses and a very expensive model to support over time When all the elements are considered, Microsoft delivers higher value at a lower cost than Netscape
Microsoft BackOffice is "inflexible"	Microsoft BackOffice beats Netscape in every category Delivers functions Netscape hasn't even dreamed of, much less delivered Is a better overall solution Gives you have the option to purchase all or merely some of the components to suit your needs Offers flexible, per-seat licensing or per-server to suit your site and needs Is supported on thousands of hardware platforms
BackOffice does not include certificate ("SSL") security	In fact it is included at no extra charge
Microsoft Internet Studio was canceled	Flat-out wrong. Internet Studio is a substantial, on-going project that sets a new mark for ease and power when publishing high-impact content on the Web