Cloudy outlook sees Microsoft take Exchange, SharePoint online

Microsoft has unveiled its latest assault on the cloud computing market with the launch of its Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS).

The arrival of BPOS will see Microsoft's enterprise apps - including Exchange Online email, SharePoint Online collaboration software, presence and IM product Office Live Meetings and, from later this year, Office Communications Online videoconferencing - sold as a single hosted software package.

As well as BPOS, Microsoft has today taken the wraps off a new cloud offering: and an email and calendaring option, Business Productivity Online Deskless Worker Suite, which includes Exchange and SharePoint.

The Deskless Worker Suite is aimed at workers that aren't normally tied to their PC all day but still need to get email and intranet access every now and again, including retail shop workers, factory workers and flight attendants, according to Microsoft.

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So far, companies including Coca-Cola and GlaxoSmithKline have signed up to use BPOS, after switching from an in-house Lotus Notes set-up.

In the UK, Scottish charity the Wise Group is one of the earliest adopters of BPOS, with some 20 staff already using the suite and the rest of the organisation's 400 or so workers following suit in the coming few months.

Wise Group CIO Alan Lee-Bourke said the switch from on-premise to hosted software will allow him to move techies from keeping the lights on to more useful projects.

"My staff spend a lot of time looking after our existing infrastructure so now I can forget about all that, and I can get them to become data managers and data custodians. It's not only cost but our data gets better too - I can redeploy the staff to more interesting things. I don't have to worry about wires and boxes," he told silicon.com.

"My organisation's not used to [cloud computing] at all. Ultimately, the argument was we don't care where our data is. As long as we get timely, accurate and relevant data, that's all we care about," Lee-Bourke added.

BPOS will be available from...

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