REDMOND, Wash. May 1, 2008 Microsoft Corp. today delivered on its commitment to rapid innovation for the newest Microsoft platforms and latest Web technologies by announcing the release of Expression Studio 2.

The suite of professional design tools includes Expression Web 2, Expression Blend 2, Expression Design 2, Expression Media 2 and Expression Encoder 2 and works seamlessly with Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008, solving the age-old designer and developer workflow challenge. The innovations in Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML), used by both Expression Studio and Visual Studio, allow for unprecedented designer-developer collaboration for the creation of both standards-based and Microsoft Silverlight-enhanced Web experiences as well as Windows Vista and .NET Framework 3.5 client applications.
The release of Expression Studio 2 flies in formation with the latest platform releases such as Silverlight and Windows Presentation Foundation and is a very exciting milestone for the industry, said Eric Zocher, general manager for Expression Studio at Microsoft. Great user experience is at the heart and soul of our Expression family of tools and is fundamental to enabling developers and designers to collaborate on building and delivering dynamic, connected applications that help customers achieve results.

Millions of customers and partners such as Conchango PLC, 2ndFACTORY Co. Ltd, Design To Business (d2B), Infusion Development, and Pink and Yellow Media are beginning to experience the newfound power of Expression Studio and delivering rich, connected client and Web applications based on Windows Presentation Foundation, Microsoft Silverlight and Microsoft ASP.NET AJAX.

The release of Expression Studio 2 signifies some major advancements in the way that designers and developers work together, which is enabling us to realize much more of our vision, and to do it more efficiently, said Paul Dawson, head of experience at Conchango. In addition, the increased connectedness between Visual Studio 2008 and Expression Studio is really beneficial. XAML is now where we live out that collaboration, which is giving us efficiencies in the design and development process of somewhere in the region of 20 percent to 30 percent, meaning our customers get much better branded user experiences, more reliable and robust code, in a shorter time frame and for a better cost.