Google makes its own pitch for Microsoft Office 'upgrades' |
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Google makes its own pitch for Microsoft Office 'upgrades'
"Microsoft Office is a great product, and every business should have a few copies."
Representatives of the Google Apps team offered up that funny quote, attributed to Google Enterprise President Dave Girouard, when we sat down recently to discuss topics including its competition with Microsoft in advance of the launch of Office 2010 and Office Web Applications.
Google's contention is that businesses would be smarter to avoid Office 2010 and use Google Apps -- in conjunction with a handful of existing Office licenses -- to make the move into the world of online collaboration. In a post this morning, Google went public with its pitch.
"If you’re considering upgrading Office with Office, we’d encourage you to consider an alternative: upgrading Office with Google Docs. If you choose this path, upgrade means what it’s supposed to mean: effortless, affordable, and delivering a remarkable increase in employee productivity. This is a refreshing alternative to the expensive and laborious upgrades to which IT professionals have become accustomed."
Of course, Microsoft would contend otherwise, and the company will be pitching the benefits of new social-networking and collaboration tools during the business launch of Office 2010 and related products in New York this week. Also see our earlier Q&A with Microsoft VP Chris Capossela about the new Office features.
Microsoft is also extending the Office Web Applications to Facebook through an initiative that it has confusingly named "Docs" -- a decision that has left the Google folks scratching their heads.
In a report this week, analysts at the Directions on Microsoft research firm said the new versions of Office products "make significant improvements for collaboration, and for business intelligence functions such as reporting and data analysis, among other areas." However, they added, "many new capabilities require coordinated upgrades of multiple products, which can complicate evaluating and deploying the new versions."
And that's the competitive opening that Google is hoping to exploit, offering up this comparative chart as part of its post this morning.
After launching Office 2010 for its large business customers this week, Microsoft will make the new programs available to consumers in June. Despite competition from Google, OpenOffice.org and others, the Redmond company's Office suite continues to be the largest player in the productivity software market, and a major source of the company's profits.
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