For the Enterprise?
Microsoft has not forgotten its business customers and has recognised some of the issues that its enhanced collaboration might bring to the enterprise. To answer this Microsoft has built in Data Loss Prevention (DLP) and Multi factor authentication to not only secure the perimeter but also stop information from leaking from the corporate boundaries.
Some of the work is not yet complete and they will be announced Enterprise Data Protection for Windows 10 later in the year with support for Office 2016 early in 2016. Information Rights management will also be added to Visio.
In fact both Visio and Project have also been updated with new features in both applications.
Conclusion
Jared Spataro, Microsoft’s general manager for Office commented to CNNMoney that: “This is a huge release for us, even though the user interface has largely stayed the same. … We’ve made the transition from ‘me work’ to ‘we work.’”
It is this collaboration that is certainly the most exciting part of this release. Office 2016 is not a revolution, bringing incredible functionality that has never been done before, but it is a significant step forward in terms of the collaboration enhancements that are leveraging cloud technology. That Microsoft are creating new App’s for Office 365 is interesting, and indicates a desire to leverage new acquisitions quickly through integration with Office rather than fully subsuming them within it.
Some of the features enhancements, especially in Excel are welcome but time will tell whether some of the others add much benefit, especially in Outlook. It is a shame that the enterprise features are not ready out of the box, users will be clamouring for collaboration features straight away and while they are enhancements it feels that Microsoft has looked to answer the end users desires rather than consider the risk appetite of companies first. It will be interesting to see how quickly companies migrate across to the new version.
Microsoft has also ensured that its cloud version is now comparable again with its competitors and it may see a surge in growth for its cloud services. This includes services that Paul Nicholas, Senior Director, Global Security Strategy and Diplomacy at Microsoft, said was doubling their storage and compute requirements on Azure every six months at yesterdays FT Cybersecurity summit.
