Founded in 2005, Meebo started out as a browser-based instant messaging service and expanded into a social toolbar product for publishers.

FORBES: Google Buying Social Toolbar Company Meebo, Team Joins Google+

Those same small businesses also need software to keep track of sales leads, which they increasingly choose to buy from firms such as Salesforce.com that deliver it as a service through the web browser, just as Google delivers search results.

ECONOMIST: Google and Salesforce.com

The programs, an addition to the company's "Lotus" group of applications, also represent one of IBM's most ambitious forays yet into enterprise software-as-a-service, the browser-based model of applications pioneered by companies like Salesforce.com.

FORBES: Enterprise