Following in the footsteps of Google Inbox and Microsoft Clutter, IBM wants to reinvent email, too. The company has announced IBM Verse, a "social mail" system for businesses that aims to help employees spend less time curating their inboxes.

IBM Verse isn't just about giving the inbox a fresh coat of paint. The system takes into account calendars, contacts, file sharing, social updates and other factors to help highlight the most important messages and give greater insights about the people exchanging them.

For starters, the software provides an "at a glance" view, which combines a person's action items from not just email, but also calendars, to-do lists and online meeting documents. IBM says the software that highlights the most important action items can learn over time and eventually predict which messages an employee should prioritize.

On any email thread, a user can click through to see a visual tree of all the people connected, how they're connected to each other, and their positions in the organization. Again, the system learns over time, so if it thinks someone is being left out, it will suggest new people to add.

IBM Verse shows the relationships between email recipients.

IBM says it created Verse with privacy and security in mind, although by its nature, the software needs broad access to company data to function. However, IBM points out it isn't in the business of selling that information to marketers. Instead, the company will sell Verse as a freemium service as part of its IBM Cloud Marketplace.

IBM Verse has some important differences from Google Inbox. Verse doesn't have a way for users to quickly go through a particular kind of message like the way Inbox does with, say, deals. But this is by design: Carolyn Pampino, the design director of the project, told Mashable that when people organize emails into categories, they often ignore some of those categories altogether.

Since Verse is aimed at businesses, it's not really challenging Inbox directly. However, IBM is pushing hard into mobile enterprise services (particularly through its partnership with Apple) and it ensured Verse has a tailored mobile experience. If enough businesses adopt it, Verse could end up being very influential in redefining email for the next decade.

IBM Verse is launching as a beta this month, with a full rollout — complete with apps in the App Store and Google Play — expected in early 2015.