Through its presence at HostingCon 2007 this week, Microsoft Corp. will announce its comprehensive strategy for enabling hosting providers to be successful in the world of software plus services. The strategy includes providing the next-generation hosting platform, delivering applications ready for hosting, and driving growth through tight integration with Microsoft’s extensive partner ecosystem. At the show, Microsoft will demonstrate recent additions and updates to its core platform technologies and applications for the hosting industry that enable service providers to offer a compelling next-generation end-user experience for their customers. Microsoft will highlight new development tools and applications to hosting providers for the first time, detail the initial successes of its Internet Information Services 7.0 (IIS7) Go Live license program for Microsoft® IIS7 beta, and announce that cPanel Inc. has introduced a Windows® version of its control panel. With these enhancements, hosting providers are well positioned to play an important role in the software plus services ecosystem by partnering with Microsoft.