The Microsoft World Partner Conference was very Office 365 oriented this year. Microsoft have been in for a lot of criticism over the last few years with the rise and rise of Google Apps. Some have suggested that Google Apps could destroy Microsoft’s dominance of the Office software market. Much of this has been hot air put out by Microsoft’s detractors but the threat has certainly been very real. A Microsoft Office killer however is an extremely audacious claim.
Office 365 at WPC
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Office 365 Enterprise
Office 365 Enterprise is now avaiable. There are 4 plans available and we are currently preparing the comparision chart for Microsofts newly released product.
Office 365 For Small Business
The rebranding and launch of Office 365 has been touted by many commentators as an exercise in marketing. It’s far from it. Others have claimed it’s not suitable for small businesses. Nothing could be further from the truth. The new small business offering (Office 365 Plan P1) can bring a massive improvement in productivity without a large IT bill. Smaller businesses running older servers now don’t need to replace these servers and can move straight to the Cloud.
Google email attacks
I would venture that it has not been the best period for Google. As Google Apps users move to a more unified service with more features, offerings and numerous 3rd party applications this should have been a great start. Google seem to be reacting to the new competition that Office 365 brings which is a very positive move for them so it must have been a devastating blow when news of Chinese attacks on Google Apps for Government hit the headlines.
Microsoft buys Skype
Microsoft has announced on 10th May that it bought Skype for $8.5 billion (roughly £5bn). The deal values Skype at around $13 for each of its 600 million registered users and there is every chance that such a deal will have an impact on the IT market. Skype is extremely widely used on pcs and mobiles alike - it will be interesting to see whether apps such as Skype for i-phone, with windows 7 phone really focused on competing against apple, will now stand the test of time?
Office 365 v Google Apps
The title of the conflict is changing from BPOS v Google Apps to Office 365 v Google Apps but it is certainly not diminishing in its ferocity. The argument remains pretty much the same but with Google Apps now perhaps looking as though it may need a facelift to remain of as much interest as its Microsoft counterpart. The only real development of the Google Apps product is the reduction in the number of free users in its ‘free’ offering (beware – nothing is without a cost of some sort) and some android apps such as Google Docs.
Office 365 Public Beta
Microsoft have launched the public beta version of Office 365. The product has been in select beta testing for months now and it is finally available for all in the final beta testing mode before the official product launch.
Start Up Britain
The cloud suites we compare here at Cloud Hypermarket are perfect for Start-up and growing companies alike. We have provided fully scalable, secure, access anywhere services to many start-up companies. These services will allow the companies to grow on demand and pay for only what they use whilst avoiding high upfront costs. We work hard to cut through the high language IT companies use to differentiate their products. Such language is confusing – especially if you are starting a business and have a great deal of more important things to focus on.
The Security Threat of Young Workers
The main cause of security breaches is human error, there are numerous reports that support this evidence – a quick serach on reasons to use remote backup will bring back a plethora of fear inducing surveys and research projects supporting this notion. The majority of this threat has been due to disgruntled employees and there are many companies who spend vast amounts of money on various data protection methods. SSL and layers of security are all very well, however, the new threat that is being earmarked is not necessarily based upon revenge or sabotage. On the contrary, young workers are using their technological knowledge to circumvent their restrictive company email to increase their productivity. This is not a malicious threat but an issue nonetheless as younger workers excercise a level of careless efficiency.
Exchange Online and Hosted Exchange
We’ve been seeing a big increase in interest in companies looking to move to various forms of Hosted Exchange – in particular MS Exchange Online. Most services are currently running on Microsoft Exchange 2007 but the release of Office 365 is going to change this in the case of Exchange Online. The upgrade to Office 365 means Exchange Online is upgraded to Exchange 2010 – at no cost to subscribers.
This is a very pleasing moment for us as we have long been informing clients about the major advantages of moving their Company Email to the cloud and one of the main attractions to a full cloud solution is that upgrades will no longer cost the massive amount of money they have in the past. Exchange Server 2010 itself was based on saving companies money on hardware and with the release of Office 365 it seems that this saving will be passed on to their subscribers (in part at least).
We can look forward to the release of the more secure version of Exchange Online based on the upgrade provide by Exchange 2010. It is fair to expect that there will be more security features such as the ability to moderate and automatically encrypt certain email groups. The major bonus though should be on the user side. Exchange Online 2010 should offer users:
