Salesforce And Adobe Partner To Offer Flash-Based Applications In The Cloud

With all of its SaaS offerings, Salesforce.com is consistently integrating with other forms of cutting edge technologies, such as Twitter, Box.net, and more to offer clients more diverse and appealing options. Today, the company is partnering with Adobe to offer the “Adobe Flash Builder,” off of Force.com, Salesforce’s platform to build and deploy enterprise applications.

The new offering is meant to allow developers and IT departments to build cloud-based rich media applications off of Force.com. Developers can use Adobe Flash Builder for Force.com to extend or enhance existing Salesforce CRM implementations and custom-built Force.com applications, or build entirely new applications to meet business needs.

Within the new offering, Adobe’s Flash Builder lets users build these cloud-based internet application that can be deployed to end-users via the browser though Adobe’s Flash Player or to the desktop through Adobe AIR.

The builder lets developers interactive UI features easily, such as drag and drop technology. Developers can also add data visualization such as charts and dashboards for better management and monitoring of applications. The new builder is also integrated with Adobe LiveCycle Data Services that lets clients automatically synchronize data between the Force.com database and an desktop-based Adobe AIR local data store, allowing developers to build apps that easily connect between the browser and the desktop. A screenshot of a application built with the Adobe Flash Builder is posted below.

Salesforce recently upgraded its Force.com platform by launching Force.com Sites, an application that lets companies build and run their applications for internal use as well as public use on Salesforce.com cloud computing platform. In terms of the enterprise, this is a big coup for Adobe’s Flash platform, which faces competition from Microsoft’s Silverlight product.