Earlier today at the ESRI User Conference, ESRI announce MapIt. MapIt enables you to create simple online maps from enterprise data. MapIt supplies base mapping from Bing Maps with the addition of ESRI-supplied data. Map delivery is with Silverlight or WPF:

MapIt is software and online services that enable you to create simple maps from your enterprise data. MapIt software transforms your data into meaningful information displayed on maps while providing access to a wealth of online data, basemaps, and task services from ESRI and Bing Maps. MapIt is built on the Microsoft platform, enabling organizations to leverage their developers' skills and IT infrastructure.

Further details are at: http://www.esri.com/software/mapit/index.html. Licenses start at $4500 per web server.

Adena Schutzberg starts by describing this as "dots on maps" but goes on to expand this as putting spatial data from SQL Server or Excel spreadsheets into maps. She sees this as possibly a way of targeting Microsoft users who don't have a GIS yet.

The ESRI slideshow does show some attractive maps that display various graphs and charts on maps in a way that could be useful for businesses but we rarely see online today. I think I would agree with Adena Schutzberg that this does appear to be a way of supplying a nicely packaged solution for Microsoft users without a GIS. Yes MapIt does not look like it is doing anything that new, but as a complete system from ESRI & Microsoft, it should find quite a few buyers. "No one was fired for buying ESRI"?