John Cox of InfoWorld got the details on the upcoming BES 5.0 while at WES. The information is not the most detailed but seems to focus more on a trend. RIM is trying to simplify the management, deployment, and maintenance of BES. Essentially making it as transparent as possible.
For example 5.0 will allow admins to monitor the status and what went wrong during an activation. It also finally does away with the management console application you had to install in favor of a web based GUI. My favorite is the fact that RIM is making it easier to create applications to be pushed out through the BES. It will also help with troubleshooting and deploying the applications.
RIM already has 10 customers running BES 5.0 so it is in production. Regular beta testing is scheduled for a couple of months from now and the full release will hopefully be out the door by the end of the year. Sadly as we saw with BES 4.1.5 these releases tend to get pushed back.
If you are a BES admin I highly recommend reading the full writeup on InfoWold.com
