Stay Connected with Richer Presence Information: Presence can now display user location and photo while giving users control through enhanced privacy settings. Presence status can be set by a user or automatically based on calendar, login status, and more. Users can individualize access levels for different contacts to share information with them.

Get Instant Information with More Meaningful Contact Cards: Users can gain greater context with data such as published phone numbers, organizational structure, and office information through a streamlined contact card experience.

Connect Instantly with IM: Users can start an IM session with a colleague for quick responses to questions. As more engagement is needed on a subject, invite multiple parties to join in on the same conversation. Also, get reconnected to the topic by rejoining existing conversations.

Connect with People Outside the Organization: Server-to-server federation capabilities allow users to utilize presence and IM with other Microsoft Communications Server users outside the corporate network. The public IM connectivity capability increases reach even further by allowing connections with several public IM networks such as MSN/Windows Live, Yahoo!, and AOL.

Keep One Contact List: Contacts are now unified across Lync 2010 and Microsoft Exchange Server.