Google announced today that Google Wave, the search giant’s incredibly ambitious new email/IM hybrid platform that was announced in May, will be opened up to some schools and businesses as part of a preview this fall. Google says that they hope to roll out the application to all Google Apps users next year.
A few months ago, Google opened up Wave to the developer community and has steadily added functionality to the product. Google says it will continue to develop the product as schools and businesses test Wave. Wave is supposed to be a hybrid of conversation and the document, where users can communicate using mutltimedia tools in the platform. Google Wave is designed to be the ultimate, real-time collaboration tool based in the cloud. Users can insert text, photos, gadgets, maps, web feeds and edit instantaneously. Organizations can also tap into Wave’s APIs to integrate with existing tools and workflows.
Sergey Brin seems to be pretty excited about Google Wave, telling TechCrunch at Google I/O that the application will set a new benchmark for productivity. It appears that Wave will be integrated into Google Apps, but it should be interesting to see the much hyped product implemented in the enterprise space.