MS Office Enters the Clouds
Posted by Brad EgelandAt the Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC09) on Monday, Microsoft announced that it was taking MS Office into the clouds. This announcement was well-anticpated last week and it was so big that it prompted Google to pre-announce their Chrome OS very early – long before there is really anything to unveil…just to get their announcement in first. Let’s look further at Microsoft’s announcement and what it means to the businesses – especially smaller organizations and cloud computing.
Microsoft announced that it will be offering a free, lightweight version of Office that is accessed via the web rather than as resident software. This move is seen as a direct hit on Google and their Google Docs offering. Google Docs is a web-based office suite that offers superior sharing and collaboration options to the conventional MS Office suite of software.
Microsoft’s Slow Progression
Eleven years ago, Microsoft began letting people access their Outlook e-mail over the Internet, though it was a few more years before it allowed customers to “rent” space on an e-mail server instead of buying the machine themselves. In November 2008, Microsoft moved its Excel spreadsheet program and a worker-collaboration product called SharePoint to the Web. Microsoft offers access to the programs for a subscription fee, so you don’t have to buy the software up-front.
Fast Forward to Now
Now Microsoft realizes that it must move much faster. On Monday at the WPC09, it publicly showed off portions of its upcoming Office 2010 suite for the first time and announced its “Office in the clouds” intentions.
What does this mean for the small business in this current economy? At a time when all business big and small are looking at ways to cut back, it means a lot. It means easier file sharing, real-time collaboration, and a nice savings to the bottom-line. Companies want full-featured products. However, lightweight versions of the Office suite of products that nearly every company has come to rely on daily is likely going to be ‘good enough’ for quite some time. Most organizations only regularly utilize 25-40% of the true functionality of the feature-ladened Office suite anyway, so switching to a cloud-based lightweight FREE (did I mention FREE?) version will – for most small businesses especially – be a no-brainer.
I’m told that the Office web applications included will be Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and OneNote and they will run inside the browser. They will be accessed using Windows Live (not Office Live…which is being discontinued). More good news is that Microsoft guarantees that they will work equally well in IE, Firefox, and Safari.
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Windy Millers Hardware & Software News says:
Do we really need another online office suite? As if Windows 7 wasn’t big enough with an estimated $200bn to be made in the first year, they want some of googles money too…
Brad Egeland says:
Considering the widespread use of MS Office and the fact that this offering will allow organizations FREE access to Word, Excel, and Powerpoint via the web…I think that’s huge. And for the small business that does not need robust functionality, but does need to cut cost, this is great news.
SharePoint Guy says:
Your site is very good. There are useful information and most importantly, for sharing great. Thank you ….
Brad Egeland says:
Thanks for the kind comments. Attempting to provide useful, helpful information to Project Managers and businesses is what this site is all about. Thanks again.
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