IBM on Tuesday launched Verse, an enterprise email application that integrates social media, file sharing and analytics. IBM Verse is integrating the many ways employees connect each day – via email, meetings, calendars, file sharing, instant messaging, social updates, video chats and more – through a single environment. It is the first messaging system to feature 'faceted search,' which enables users to pinpoint and retrieve specific information they're seeking across all the various types of content within their email.

IBM Verse uses built-in analytics to provide an 'at-a-glance' view that surfaces an individual’s most critical actions for the day. It features one-click ability to share content as a blog post rather than an email and share files through cloud-based communities. By learning employee preferences and priorities over time, it provides instant context about a given project as well as the people and teams collaborating on it.

IBM also plans to offer its clients a future option to embed a Watson feature into their email environment, enabling them to query Watson on a given topic and receive a direct reply.

IBM will offer a beta release of the new application to select enterprise clients and partners in November 2014. A freemium version delivered via the IBM Cloud Marketplace will be available to individuals in the first quarter of 2015. IBM Verse will also be offered as an app for both iOS and Android.