Microsoft Office debuts on iOS — for iPhone, not iPad

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After months and even years of speculation, Microsoft this morning finally released a version of its core Office productivity programs — Word, Excel and PowerPoint — for Apple’s iOS mobile operating system. But it’s designed specifically for iPhone, and the company is still refraining from releasing a native version for the iPad. Office Mobile for… Read More…

Insights from Duane Campbell, a Microsoft coding legend who’s retiring after 28 years

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Duane Campbell is retiring from Microsoft today, after 28 years as a software developer with the company. Chances are you’ve never heard of him, even if you follow the company closely, and that’s one of the best parts of his story. Rather than following the traditional management and executive path that put some of his… Read More…

Office on iPad: Microsoft wrestling with $2.5B tradeoff

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Microsoft is forgoing as much as $2.5 billion a year in extra revenue by not yet putting a full-fledged version of its Office suite on Apple’s iPad. That’s the estimate by Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Holt, as reported by Fortune magazine today. There were a series of reports last year that Microsoft was working on… Read More…

New era for Office: Microsoft launches yearly subscription for home users

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Microsoft is launching a new version of Office for Windows PCs and Macs today, with a new twist: Families and home users will have the option to subscribe to the productivity suite for the first time — skipping the one-time licensing cost and instead paying a recurring annual fee of $99.99/year. Previously Office subscriptions were… Read More…

Looking for a job at Google? Better know Microsoft Office

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Google’s momentum vs. Microsoft Office is in the news today: The New York Times reports that Google has scored “an impressive string of wins” during the past year with big companies opting for Google Apps and ditching Microsoft Office. The story highlights problems for Microsoft including higher prices and complex licensing. IDC analyst Melissa Webster tells the… Read More…

Support documents show Microsoft Office coming to iPad

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It looks more and more like Microsoft Office is coming to Apple’s iPad. There have been rumors and screenshots of Office potentially coming to iOS devices, but now new documents at official French and Romanian Office support sites show references to an Office app for both the iPhone and iPad. First reported by French website mac4ever,… Read More…

The next version of Microsoft Office: A user’s perspective

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I was in attendance at yesterday’s Microsoft event in San Francisco where the company unveiled the new version of Office. We are part of a small group of customers who have been evaluating the new version over the past couple of months using a pre-release version of Windows 8 and Office 2013 running on a… Read More…

First look: Microsoft remakes Office for tablets and the cloud

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Microsoft is giving its first public glimpse of the next version of Office today, showing off an overhauled interface and new features intended to make Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint and other traditional programs work on touch-screen tablets as well as computers with keyboards and mice. But some of the biggest changes are in the way… Read More…

Another big week for Microsoft: Office news, earnings report

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It has been a big summer for Microsoft already, with a steady drumbeat of announcements — including the unveiling of its Surface tablet computer, the acquisitions of Yammer and Perceptive Pixel, the first official details of the Windows 8 release schedule and, on the down side, the $6.2 billion aQuantive write-down. Expect the news to… Read More…

Microsoft Office on iPad: The Daily has a picture, says release possible in coming weeks

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We’ve been debating whether Microsoft is planning to come out with a version of Office for the iPad, and The Daily is back today with some good news for anyone hoping to see it happen. The Daily’s Matt Hickey, who originally reported last year that Office on the iPad was coming, reiterates in the new… Read More…

Office on the iPad: A litmus test for the modern Microsoft

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We know now that Microsoft is working on a touch-friendly version of Microsoft Office for Windows 8. But here comes that age-old question, resurfacing once again: What about Microsoft Office on the iPad? Veteran analyst Rick Sherlund, now with Nomura Research, threw some cold water on the possibility in a note to clients this morning. Wrote… Read More…

Microsoft launches secretive Office 15 preview, calls it ‘most ambitious undertaking yet’

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Microsoft this morning launched a technical preview of the next generation of its Office programs — releasing the products to a selected group of customers who will test them privately and provide feedback to the company under the terms of non-disclosure agreements. The company announced the milestone this morning and promised a public beta during… Read More…

Microsoft Lync apps now available for iPhone and iPad

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Microsoft’s Lync product group today rounded out its lineup of mobile apps with the release of apps for iPhone and iPad, bringing a core component of business communications lineup to the Apple devices. Lync was also recently made available for Google Android and Microsoft’s Windows Phone. The mobile apps offer instant messaging, audio conferencing, and… Read More…

Microsoft charging for consumer tech support with new ‘Answer Desk’ service

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How much support should come free with the purchase of a tech product? And when does it become something people should pay for? The issue isn’t clear-cut, which makes the debut of Microsoft’s new “Answer Desk” online service an interesting experiment, at least. Rolled out quietly by the Redmond company last week, it’s an online… Read More…

The future is amazing, and Microsoft has video to prove it

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This might be as close as we’re going to get to a time machine. Unless they’re working on that, too. Microsoft this morning is premiering a new video that shows how the company believes technology is poised to evolve over the next five to 10 years, based on the trends its researchers and engineers are… Read More…

Geek of the Week: Jeff Teper, father of Microsoft SharePoint

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Our latest Geek of the Week, Jeff Teper, had been at Microsoft for about six years in 1998 when he oversaw the formation of a new group focused on “knowledge management.” Later that group would launch a new business collaboration technology, then called SharePoint Portal Server. SharePoint has since become one of Microsoft’s largest products, surpassing… Read More…

Office 365: Microsoft, Google jostle for bragging rights

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Microsoft is expected to launch its Office 365 service tomorrow, charging businesses a monthly subscription — rather than a one-time licensing fee — for online versions of SharePoint, Exchange, the Lync communications server and desktop versions of Office. In a recent interview with GeekWire, the president of the Microsoft Office division, Kurt DelBene, described the service… Read More…

Microsoft says Office is still growing fast — cloud or not

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Microsoft is marking the first anniversary of the Office 2010 launch today with a series of stats that show the company’s flagship productivity software continuing to fare well despite the rise of free online alternatives such as Google Docs. Microsoft says its business customers are upgrading to the new version five times faster than they… Read More…

Apple brings iWork to iPhone, Microsoft’s Mac unit still mum on Office for iPhone

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Apple this morning debuted versions of its iWork productivity applications for iPhone and iPod touch, adapting the Pages word processing, Numbers spreadsheet and Keynote presentation software for use on the smaller iOS devices. The programs will be available for $9.99 each, or as a free update for users of the existing iWork apps for Apple’s… Read More…

Microsoft vets (and brothers) sell startup OffiSync to Jive

Oudi and Roy Antebi

Business collaboration company Jive Software of Palo Alto is buying OffiSync, a Seattle-based startup known for a plug-in that adds social and collaboration features to Microsoft Office programs. OffiSync was founded by two Microsoft veterans, brothers Oudi and Roy Antebi, who have been working out of Seattle and Israel. Tony Zingale, Jive CEO, calls it “a… Read More…