Google has befriended Salesforce.com and recruited the company to battle Microsoft. Salesforce’s customer relationship management software and Google’s suite of office productivity applications, which includes e-mail, word processing and spreadsheets programs will be integrated into a single software package that will be offered over the web.

The offering competes with Microsoft’s customer relationship management software, which is integrated with the its Office suite. Google is seeking to displace Microsoft by offering a web based alternative.

Dave Girouard, Google’s Vice President said the product would have new features like letting users keep track of e-mail sent to a customer right on that customer’s sales record, and a group of people collaborating on a sales account would be able to communicate by instant message with one another”.

“In the history of hosted software to date, applications could be like islands,” Mr. Girouard said. “They don’t really work together seamlessly. This is a first of its kind.”

“Salesforce has belatedly recognized that it is important to link C.R.M. apps to productivity tools,” said Brad Wilson, general manager for Microsoft’s C.R.M. unit. “It has been core to our product since we launched five years ago. It validates our strategy.”

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend, so that makes Google my best friend,” said Marc Benioff, chief executive of Salesforce.com. However, Google has introduced a service called Google Market Solutions that competes directly with Salesforce’s App Exchange. Also see Google Is Frienemy.