Altova, creator of XMLSpy, the industry leading XML editor, today announced the public beta launch of MetaTeam – a new team management and project collaboration cloud service.

MetaTeam is a different kind of project management solution. It breaks down the mysteries of team organization into simple steps that anyone – not just project managers – can use effectively. Specifically designed to foster agile collaboration, MetaTeam makes teams more productive by creating an environment of transparency and information accessibility. At the same time, for larger teams and more elaborate projects it raises accountability and commitment by spelling out individual roles and responsibilities.

“Altova has dedicated itself to meeting the needs of development teams since its founding in 1992. Each of our XML, database, and UML tools is designed to simplify development projects and help you create high-quality applications. MetaTeam extends this mission even further,” said Alexander Falk, President & CEO of Altova. “In the same way that our development tools make sometimes complex best practices straightforward, MetaTeam offers practical solutions to the organizational challenges high performance teams face every day.”

MetaTeam is not just for developers. Business teams in any capacity can access its powerful tools to enhance collaboration and efficiency in managing projects of any kind.  In addition, MetaTeam has proven attractive to department managers and committees.

This revolutionary cloud service includes integrated apps for managing to-dos, team member roles and responsibilities, project-specific terms and documentation, structured decision making, team member information, and more. Threaded discussions and customizable email alerts promote communication and clarity.

Here is a glimpse of some features MetaTeam offers:
• Elegant, intuitive interface – Lowers resistance so team members can start collaborating immediately.
• To-Dos app – Provides a hierarchical, task-based overview of your project. Easily track assignments, deadlines, and statuses. Structured collaboration ensures clear communication. Deep integration across apps keeps deadline-driven tasks connected to the big picture.
• Roles app – Allows teams to clarify roles and responsibilities including necessary skills and FTEs (full time equivalents) to focus team efforts. An updatable matrix makes aligning and understanding roles and responsibilities quick and easy.
• Decisions app – Enables teams to prioritize and make decisions in a structured, transparent way, with ranking, voting, and associated to-dos. Its integrated capabilities help teams classify, prioritize, collaborate on, and ultimately make decisions that support the project’s goals and objectives.
• Knowledge Base app – Helps teams organize and share vital project information with an easy-to-use, fully integrated wiki. Teams collaborate on project-specific articles, which can then be linked to from relevant tasks, decisions, discussions, and other Knowledge Base articles. Now each stakeholder has the context-specific knowledge and expertise of other team members at his or her fingertips.    
• Glossary app – Lets teams define a project-specific vocabulary, ensuring everyone uses the same terms for the same concepts. Glossary terms are automatically cross-linked wherever they occur in MetaTeam providing instant clarity.
• Threaded discussions – Foster and document collaborative efforts. Discussions are supported in To-Dos, Knowledge Base, Roles, and Decisions apps.
• Integrated email notification service – Fully customizable on a per-user basis for instant notifications as well as easy-to-use digests of important updates.
• 24×7 availability – MetaTeam is cloud-based so it is accessible to all team members at all times, regardless of their location.
• And so much more!

As a truly effective collaborative environment, MetaTeam removes barriers to productivity by transforming project stakeholders into project owners. To learn more about MetaTeam, view an introductory video, and create a free account, visit http://metateam.net.

Availability and Pricing
MetaTeam is currently in a free, public beta phase and is open to all users.