BMC's Service Desk Express will be sold, marketed and available via Salesforce.com, which company executives say will enable more IT departments to take advantage of enterprise level service desk technology. The partnership news comes from the hosted by Salesforce.com, at which BMC and Salesforce.com executives are scheduled to discuss the collaboration.

"By delivering service desk technology via the cloud, you can abstract all the complexity of the infrastructure that rely on IT services delivery and follow best practices," says Bob Beauchamp, BMC chairman and CEO. "BMC and Salesforce will use our resources to deliver the technology so customers don't have to expend theirs. They can get a service desk configured, up and running rapidly and do it efficiently at a price point that I would argue could be the lowest in the industry."

Beauchamp was unable to disclose specific pricing at this time, but said the joint offering will be available in spring 2010 and will rival current offerings that deliver IT management service desk capabilities via the cloud. Competitors such as CA and HP offer on-demand versions of software applications, and and start-up use software-as-a-service as their calling card to customers. Industry watchers say BMC's efforts will be well-received by customers and provide ample competition to existing offerings.

"The move is excellent from a go-to-market strategy as Salesforce.com sales representatives have the right reach into the target audience to sell BMC Service Desk Express. The solution is a very powerful one as a license already and for customers who are committed to SaaS for whatever reason in the SMB, this is a great fit," says Evelyn Hubbert, senior analyst covering infrastructure and operations at Forrester Research. She adds that the new service is also "a bit of a slamming of Service-now – as Salesforce.com really opened up the SaaS space."