I spent time at the SharePoint Conference this week and after listening to the keynote on Monday morning, I noticed the conspicuous absence of any mobile discussion whatsoever. There was a lot of talk about the cloud, but none--and I mean zip, zero, bubkes--about mobile and how it can bring together the cloud and social aspects Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) was clearly emphasizing throughout the keynote.

This was particularly curious for a number of reasons. First of all, you couldn't go anywhere in the wake of Microsoft's Build Conference last month without hearing about Windows 8 and Metro, the new programming language based on the Windows Phone 7 tile interface.

In fact, when I asked Jared Spataro, senior director of product management for SharePoint about this seeming disconnect, he gave a careful answer, but suggested that Microsoft wasn't going to announce anything until it was close to ready.

"We are very committed to mobile as a scenario," he said, then cited the Microsoft party line about looking for the best productivity across PC, phone and browser. He added, "Mobile continues to be important. We have a great story on the Win Phone." He then pulled out his phone and showed me the integration.

Cool, yes it's on Windows Phone 7, but it doesn't explain the lack of mobile talk. It seems that other companies get this and have built mobile into their platforms. Open Text showed me an iPhone app back in 2009 at Enterprise 2.0, long before most companies were thinking about this, and Open Text bought weComm earlier this year to help customers build cross-platform mobile applications. It has a clear mobile story to tell.

A company like Box.net has mobile built into its DNA. It instinctively gets the mobile-cloud connection, so why does it seem that SharePoint failed to connect the dots?

Lubor Ptacek, vice president of Strategic Marketing and general manager of the Microsoft Solutions Group at OpenText, says Microsoft might be facing a dilemma when it comes to mobile. He explained that SharePoint is obviously targeted at the IT department and mobile devices tend to be bought by users. He said that perhaps Microsoft believes that IT is just more comfortable with the desktop, so it's keeping its focus there.

Spataro insisted that while Microsoft understands the mobile-cloud connection, it might not be completely ready to discuss that particular scenario until it's close to a complete product. I suppose that's fair, especially given that Microsoft has been slammed in the past for making announcements and then not delivering on what was initially announced. Still, it seems odd that it wouldn't at least allude to it even if briefly in its keynote vision.

Spataro admitted that Microsoft might be a bit shy because of the rapid pace of mobility. "Who would have thought Blackberry would be where is it today?" he asked. Given that, it's a hard space to know where to place bets. That being said, if a small company like Box.net can devote resources to HP (NASDAQ: HPQ), and not blink when the market collapsed, it seems that a company like Microsoft with much deeper pockets could afford to set up SharePoint on multiple platforms, even if a few of them went away faster than expected.

Spataro might have a point about how quickly mobile changes, but Microsoft is clearly missing a huge opportunity here to pull together a complete mobile-cloud picture and it's surprising and a bit frustrating that a tool as successful as SharePoint isn't front and center with a clear mobile strategy.

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