14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft’s Cloud productivity suite has hit the general availability milestone, Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer announced at an event in New York. Office 365 is the result of Office meeting the Cloud, the company’s CEO revealed. However, it must be underlined that Office 365 is in no way an equivalent or a replacement for the Office productivity suite, Office 2010 included.
What the software giant is offering with Office 365 is a collection of services, Cloud equivalents of on-premises solutions from the company, such as Exchange Server, SharePoint, and Lync.
Customers paying monthly subscriptions of no more than $27 per user will be able to enjoy Microsoft Cloud offerings such as SharePoint Online, Exchange Online and Lync Online, Office Web Apps and even Office 2010.
At the time of launch, Office 365 is available to customers worldwide in no less than 40 markets, the company noted.
“Great collaboration is critical to business growth, and because it’s so important, we believe the best collaboration technology should be available to everyone,” Ballmer said.
“With a few clicks, Office 365 levels the playing field, giving small and midsize businesses powerful collaboration tools that have given big businesses an edge for years.”
Still, Office 365 is not geared exclusively to midsize companies or large enterprises. Flavors of the Cloud productivity suite are available for as less as $2 per user per month, with small businesses and professionals being able to take advantage of Office 365 for as little as $6 per user per month.
The software giant also stressed the importance of the Office 365 service provider partner ecosystem that is building, which already features companies as: Bell Canada, Intuit Inc., NTT Communications Corp., Telefonica S.A., Telstra Corp. and Vodafone Group Plc.
“Our partners represent some of the best-known, most-trusted brands in their local markets,” explained Kurt DelBene, president, Microsoft Office Division. “Our customers will be able to rest easy knowing their cloud services are backed by Microsoft and some of the greatest service providers in the world.”