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Microsoft Plots New Office System Release

Posted on: Saturday, 13 November 2004, 03:00 CST

VP says vendor plans to continue cycle of two to three years between upgrades

A Microsoft Corp. executive confirmed last week that the company intends to continue shipping a new version of its Office System software every two to three years.

That would place the release date for the next version of the product suite, known as Office 12 within Microsoft, between next October and October 2006, since Office System 2003 shipped a year ago last month. But Chris Capossela, vice president of Microsoft's information worker product management group, said he isn't ready to discuss any specific dates.

"What I am ready to say is Office has had a fantastic 100% track record of shipping a new version every two to three years after the prior version," he said. "And I think the next version will be in that time frame too."

Capossela also gave few details about the new functionality that's expected to be included in Office 12. But he noted that corporate users have been asking for more help with managing documents and other content.

Microsoft's main document management product is Share-Point Portal Server, which is part of Office System. Capossela said the company wants to "raise the bar in what Share-Point does," but he also sees a "great partner opportunity" for other vendors to address gaps in functionality.

In response to another customer request, Microsoft will try to make it easier for mobile users to connect to Share-Point Portal sites, according to Capossela. He said end users currently can't access the sites unless they "VPN into" their corporate networks.

Packaging Questions

Speculation is mounting that Microsoft may add new server products to Office System. But Capossela said the company hasn't decided how the Office 12 functionality will be packaged. "So if someone says, 'Hey, is there going to be an Excel server? Is there going to be a Word server? Is there going to be a Visio server?' we literally don't know yet," he said.

But Microsoft is pushing ahead on its vision of an Office System that includes desktop applications, server software, and services designed to help teams of workers collaborate, he added.

Michael Silver, an analyst at Gartner Inc., said momentum among corporate users appears to be building for the Office 2003 suite of desktop applications. According to a survey of 184 clients at a recent Gartner conference, half of their combined total of PCs are likely to be running Office 2003 by the end of next year, he said.

Silver added that he expects the new version of Office System to ship in the same time frame as the desktop version of the next major Windows release, code-named Longhorn - in the second half of 2006 at the earliest.

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Microsoft Corp.

Copyright Computerworld Inc. Nov 8, 2004

Source: Computerworld

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