SMS 2003 is Microsoft Corporation's strategic solution for change and configuration management of Windows-based systems. As hardware and software assets comprise a large portion of the IT budget, businesses are becoming more focused on finding ways to reduce these costs while continuing to deliver valuable capabilities. SMS 2003 delivers on this by reducing the overall operational costs of managing and deploying software.

Simplified, Reliable Software Deployment
By providing a comprehensive solution for planning, testing, deploying, analyzing and optimizing software applications, SMS 2003 delivers end-to-end capabilities to help enable the seamless deployment of the latest business productivity application to every device - from server to handheld.
 
Understanding Software Assets
SMS 2003 provides an integrated way to not only know what applications are installed, but to track application usage as well. It can track which users are running applications, for how long and how many instances concurrently. This functionality is fully integrated with the enterprise scalable inventory of SMS 2003 and will allow you to save money on potential new application purchases, stay compliant on existing products and effectively phase out unused applications, resulting in enterprises using what is paid for and paying only for what is used.
 
Securing the Enterprise
SMS 2003 delivers an enterprise-proven solution for managing update deployment, providing a set of tools and processes that enables quick and easy determination of Windows-based systems in need of critical updates and the ability to test and reliably deploy these updates throughout their environment, allowing enterprises to proactively maintain the integrity of their Windows environment.
 
Supporting a Mobile Workforce
By using the rich manageability infrastructure in the Windows operating system, industry standard Internet technologies such as HTTP and the technology and best practices from Windows Update—used today to implement hundreds of millions of software updates per month—SMS 2003 has extended its enterprise scalable asset management and software distribution solution to the mobile client. Software can be distributed to machines over slow link connections without interrupting the core business functions and as users move from location to location, SMS 2003 determines their physical location and enables the download of critical software from the closest source.
 
Windows Management Services Integration
SMS 2003 provides an increased level of manageability for Windows-based clients by integrating with the Windows platform and then investing in the backend technologies, such as Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI), Active Directory?and Windows Installer Services.