WebProNews

ActiveState's CTO and VP of engineering, David Ascher, will helm Mozilla's new effort to build upon their Thunderbird email client. Ascher's new home at Mozilla, currently code-named MailCo, starts with a nice piece of change. Mozilla announced they would provide $3 million in seed funding to start this new mail-focused company.

At the heart of MailCo's work lays Thunderbird, Mozilla's email client. The product has not been susceptible to the vulnerabilities that have befallen its well-known competitor, Microsoft Outlook. Thunderbird is also freely available.

"Innovating in mail and communications advances our vision of choice across the spectrum of Internet software," said Mitchell Baker, Chair, Mozilla Foundation. "David has been a respected member of the Mozilla community for many years and we're excited that he is joining Mozilla to lead this important effort."

We hope some of that innovation will include the implementation of an effective calendar within Thunderbird. Calendar functionality has been a lone bright spot for Outlook, and makes it tough for anyone with an active schedule to leave behind for Mozilla's option.

Mozilla said Thunderbird's millions of current members need not worry about the product. They plan to continue security and stability updates as they have always done for Thunderbird users.