Microsoft has now released the business versions and price plans for the revamped Office 365. The configuration of the bundles and pricing models reflect the consumer market line up (see here) – and the push to cloud and subscriptions.
The new line up comprises Office 365 ProPlus (an includes install on up to five devices, streamed deployment, SkyDrive access, deploy alongside previous versions of Office), Office 365 Midsize (for business with 10-250 employees) and Office 365 Small Business Premium (1-10 employees). Each includes access to a different set of features. The new editions join something like 6 other configurations for business, plus others for education and government. Buyers can mix and match versions to meet requirements of different user groups but selecting the right version of Office 365 is not a simple process and is increasingly complicated compared to Google Apps.
With this latest release Microsoft has greatly broadened the availability of cloud-based Office so the question now is what impact it will have on the market. Microsoft is not disclosing numbers about how many Office subscription customers it has but says Office 365 has been adopted by one in five of its enterprise customers (vs. one in seven last year) and small and medium business customers have grown 150% percent in the past year. Even the company admits that the move to a subscription model will be a journey for some customers and we think businesses will be nervous about the ultimate cost. Nevertheless Google is likely to respond with updates to its suite so there will be no shortage of supplier activity. And there is an argument that if users accept subscriptions on everyday applications like Office, it will promote subscription adoption further up the application stack.