The McGraw-Hill Cos.'s McGraw-Hill Education group and Microsoft have agreed to develop, publish, market and distribute professional and technical books for the global education market. The new McGraw-Hill— Microsoft Press imprint will include certain information technology books from both companies as well as new titles deverloped under the agreement. The early focus will be on the higher education market.

Among the products that are part of the imprint is Microsoft's academic learning series, used to obtain the MCSE (Microsoft Certified Software Engineer) and MCSA (Microsoft Certified Software Administrator) certificates. Offerings will be available in print, multimedia and network-ready formats. M-H will distribute the titles through its higher education, elhi and global sales forces as well as through its online bookstore at www.books.mcgraw-hill.com.

Ed Stanford, president of the M-H higher education group, said the imprint will combine M-H's introductory professional and technical books with Microsoft intermediate and advanced IT learning materials.