Microsoft today announced Microsoft Office 365, the company's latest cloud productivity package. Office 365 meshes Office, SharePoint Online, Exchange Online, and Lync Online into a single always-up-to-date service. Office 365 lets users work together from anywhere while collaborating with others inside and outside their organization. Microsoft said Office 365 works with the most popular browsers, smartphones, and desktop applications people use today.
Office 365 for small businesses, professionals, and companies with fewer than 25 employees takes about 15 minutes to set up. It offers Office Web Apps, Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Lync Online, and an external website for $6 or €5.25 per user, per month.
Office 365 for enterprises starts at $2 or €1.75 per user, per month for basic e-mail. At the other extreme, organizations can get Office Professional Plus, e-mail, voicemail, enterprise social networking, instant messaging, Web portals, extranets, voice conferencing, Web conferencing, 24x7 phone support, and on-premises licenses for $24 or €22.75 per user, per month. The inclusion of Office Professional Plus marks the first time that Microsoft will offer the flagship desktop office suite on a pay-as-you-go basis. Both the small business and enterprise offerings will have a minimum buy-in of just one seat.
At 2pm CDT a limited beta program for Office 365 will launch at
Office365.com. The beta will initially be available in 13 countries and regions "for a few thousand organizations," before expanding over the next few months. Microsoft aims to have Office 365 available in 40 regions next year.
After launching the service in 2011, Microsoft will eventually expand Office 365 to include Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online. The company will also launch Office 365 for education. This will give all organizations access to Microsoft's complete business productivity experience and will also give students, faculty, and school employees access to technology tailored specifically to their needs.
"Office 365 is the best of everything we know about productivity, all in a single cloud service," Kurt DelBene, president of the Office Division at Microsoft, said in a statement. "With Office 365, your local bakery can get enterprise-caliber software and services for the first time, while a multinational pharmaceutical company can reduce costs and more easily stay current with the latest innovations. People can focus on their business, while we and our partners take care of the technology."
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