Microsoft Office or Google Apps?

(Editor’s note: Google Apps may have reached a point where companies should give it some consideration in given circumstances. Check out our article, and the accompanying interview with veteran Jupiter Research analyst Michael Gartenberg, who shares his views of the Microsoft side of the debate.)

Whether your company uses Microsoft Office or not, and plenty do, Google would like you to consider ‘complementing’ that desktop productivity suite with its software as a service options from Google Apps. Capgemini’s deal with Google could lead some clients with large numbers of entry level staffers to switch them to Google Apps.

It looks like a simple question of mathematics at a high level overview. Why put a copy of Office, with all of its sophisticated features, on the desktops of dozens of people who only need basic functionality. Why support patches and updates for Office with in-house staff when Google will do all of that under the hood work for you?

Here’s a brief rundown of what Google Apps offers to those who embrace it: word processing, spreadsheets, email (with 10GB storage), calendar, IM/voice client, web page creation, all available from a corporate-branded, centrally managed start page.

All a worker would need besides the PC and Internet connection would be a headset, for use with Google Talk. That application may not receive much use on the voice side, as we think Google Apps would be destined for "cube farm" setups like call centers.

Google’s document and spreadsheet handling can convert various file formats for viewing. A higher-level staffer distributing an Excel spreadsheet or Word document to the masses would not have to worry about others being able to read it.

If they publish it through Google Docs & Spreadsheets, the document in question can be managed from one place in terms of access and availability.

Capgemini said in its statement about the deal that the benefits of such a software as a service (SaaS) offering goes beyond just tools:

SaaS solutions, such as Google Apps Premier Edition, provide a cost-effective, easy-to-deploy alternative to installed, licensed desktop software; they are delivered over the Internet via a Web browser and do not require companies to install or maintain software locally, or to tap into internal IT resources.

Email management, especially when it comes to the volumes of spam hitting inboxes, creates nonstop issues for system administrators. Instead of bogging down networks and people with the task of maintaining email, Google does the heavy lifting.

Doing SaaS presents a concern, highlighted by Microsoft in its rebuttal. It’s the same concern that led firms to abandon client-server apps in favor of desktop software – the issue of the application server, or a network, going down while people are trying to work with Google Apps.

Outages are not unheard of, even at Google. They aren’t unheard of on the PC side, either. Is the chance of a network or Google outage any greater than that of a PC problem? Watch the video.

There is another aspect to Google Apps that hasn’t received much attention. It could be a factor that impresses the IT department from a security standpoint. Google Apps function with the Firefox browser just as well as they do with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

If Google Apps does fill a need for companies that can’t or won’t provide Office for their lower-level staff, it makes sense to have Firefox as a required browser to accompany Google Apps. These workers would avoid the security issues that sometimes crop up when an IE-centric zero-day exploit appears.

Judging by Capgemini’s talk, offering Google Apps is a small step into empowering a lot of people who would not have such a productivity resource made available to them. Not every company is on a scale where they need a Capgemini to come in and make this happen.

But in this age, all a company needs is an Internet connection, and some time to sign up for and enable Google Apps. It’s an option firms should at least consider before writing that check for Office licenses.

(Requests for comment from Microsoft and Google had not been responded to by the time of this writing.)

» Watch the video with Jupiter Research analyst Michael Gartenberg

Google, CapGemini Deal Panics Microsoft

There’s nothing like a full-blown case of The Fear to bring out a point by point refutation of the client/server ecology of online applications. Microsoft’s list of corporate-speak appeared on Mary Jo Foley’s blog, attributed to a company spokesperson, and it’s all about keeping enterprises in line.

Microsoft’s fear is well-justified. Its Office productivity suite represents one of the company’s two major revenue streams, with Windows being the other. Office is as close to a fixture on corporate desktops as is the web browser.

We aren’t going to dissect Microsoft’s list of concerns point by point, because there’s only one that really matters. That would be point number five:

Google

]]> http://www.webpronews.com/google-capgemini-deal-panics-microsoft-2007-09/feed 2 http://www.webpronews.com/google-ready-to-seduce-corporate-world-2007-09 http://www.webpronews.com/google-ready-to-seduce-corporate-world-2007-09#comments Mon, 10 Sep 2007 10:56:30 +0000 WebProNews Staff http://www.webpronews.com/?p=40295 The company’s Google Apps collection of productivity software will be the thin end of the wedge Google hopes to drive between corporations and their long-time love of Microsoft Office.

Google Ready To Seduce Corporate World

Throughout the assembly of Google Apps, many have speculated breathlessly that Google would threaten Microsoft’s near-eternal dominance of the desktop during the age of the PC.

That theory will take a small step toward reality today, but the fight for corporate desktop share looks like it will start in Europe. The Guardian reported IT consulting giant CapGemini will promote Google Apps to its customers:

“Microsoft is an important partner to us as is IBM,” said the head of partnerships at CapGemini’s outsourcing business, Richard Payling. “In our client base we have a mix of Microsoft users and Lotus Notes users and we now have our first Google Apps user. But CapGemini is all about freedom, giving clients choice of the most appropriate technology that is going to fit their business environment.”

“If you look at the traditional desktop it is very focused on personal productivity,” said Robert Whiteside, Google enterprise manager, UK and Ireland. “What Google Apps brings is team productivity.”

Google Apps also removes something from those environments: the Microsoft (or IBM/Lotus) “tax” in the form of expensive licensing fees. Participating firms will pay CapGemini the $50 per-person annual license fee, which should be a significant savings over Office upgrades and Microsoft client licenses.

Google won’t wipe Microsoft away from the desktop entirely. Microsoft’s applications have become too standardized, and Google lacks an integrated calendar within Gmail. Outlook’s calendar has always been a bright spot in Microsoft’s suite, but not every employee needs it.

Instead, we think Google Apps will find a place on the desktops of cubicle workers rather than the sales and executive types who live and die on Microsoft applications. Imagine removing Office from a hundred cubicles and replacing it with Google.

That’s the kind of cost savings that makes corporate accountants salivate into their spreadsheets.

]]> http://www.webpronews.com/google-ready-to-seduce-corporate-world-2007-09/feed 0 http://www.webpronews.com/merrill-lynch-and-capgemini-publish-world-wealth-report-2005-06 http://www.webpronews.com/merrill-lynch-and-capgemini-publish-world-wealth-report-2005-06#comments Fri, 10 Jun 2005 20:38:52 +0000 Chris Crum http://www.webpronews.com/?p=19490 Yesterday, Merrill Lynch and Capgemini, published the 2005 World Wealth Report. It said that last year, high net worth investors (HNWIs), took a “hold and see” stance as interest rates began to rise and stock market returns moderated from the year before.

HNWIs include all people whose assets amount to at least US$1 million. It also said that equities continued to represent the highest percentage of HNWI portfolio assets but were reduced slightly to 34% last year from 35% in 2003.

According to the report, fixed income investments were the next largest percentage of HNWI portfolios, increasing to 27% in 2004 from 25% in 2003. Cash also increased over that period, from 10% to 12%, as well as alternative investments including private equity, from 13% to 14%.

“High net worth investors and their advisors try to anticipate rather than follow market trends and get ahead of the curve in their investing strategies. The asset allocation changes that we saw in 2004, while subtle, are slightly more defensive and are also consistent with the kind of anticipatory behavior we have seen from HNWIs in the past,” said James P. Gorman, Executive Vice President of Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. and Head of Corporate Acquisitions, Strategy and Research.

The most dramatic change occurred in real estate investments. They fell from 17% to 13%, indicating that HNWIs took some profits in 2004 after several years of strong returns in an investment class that includes direct real estate investments and REITs.

“While HNWIs remain well diversified worldwide, there are clear regional differences in asset allocation. Wealthy investors in North America remain the most committed to equities, while Latin American HNWIs maintained the lowest average percentage of equities in their portfolios. Real estate investments in Asia-Pacific and Europe remained higher than the global average, and investors worldwide lowered their exposure to the U.S. dollar,” said Capgemini’s Global Wealth Management Practice Vice President Petrina Dolby.

The report says that among alternative investments, private equity attracted renewed interest, with substantial investment flows into this asset class during the second half of 2004. HNWIs were attracted by strong performance, as the US private equity index outperformed other market indices in 2004.

As Merrill Lynch says in a press release, many financial advisors interviewed for the 2005 World Wealth Report said that their clients reduced their rate of investment in hedge funds from 2003 to 2004, consistent with a declining rate of return in this asset class over that time period. Increasingly, hedge funds are viewed as a source of portfolio diversification rather than generators of out-sized returns.

HNWIs continued to use foreign investments to diversify their portfolios. While North America remained the preferred destination for investment, high returns generated in the emerging markets drew investment to the Asia-Pacific region. Foreign exchange is expected to become more popular with HNWIs for enhancing returns and hedge risk.

Chris is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest ebusiness news.

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