What Will It Cost?
Obviously, Microsoft Online Services will
need to be cost-effective for customers
to embrace it, but when you compare its
costs to the costs of maintaining the individual
servers and employing the people
needed to do so, it becomes clear that
Microsoft has at least reached a logical
starting point. The monthly licensing fee
or User Subscription License (USL) for
the entire Microsoft Online Services suite
is $15 per user per month, with reduced
costs according to volume. Customers
can also opt to license individual services.
Exchange Online Standard, for example, is
about $10 a month and SharePoint Online
is $7.25.
Microsoft is also offering web-only
USLs with reduced capabilities. These
so-called Deskless Worker licenses will
cost $3 per month for the entire suite
and $2 each per month for the Deskless
Worker versions of Exchange Online or
SharePoint Online. One obvious limitation:
With a Deskless Worker license, the
user can access Exchange only via OWA,
not Outlook.
When Will This Occur?
Microsoft will ship the initial version of
Microsoft Online Services in the second
half of 2008. This will include US versions of
Exchange Online, Office SharePoint Online,
Office Live Meeting, Microsoft Dynamics
CRM Online, and a beta version of Office
Communications Online. In 2009, Microsoft
will provide Microsoft Online Services
to customers internationally and ship a
final version of Office Communications
Online. The company is also preparing
to add to the Microsoft Online Services
product line, though it’s not saying what
it will add.
Recommendations
Although I know some companies will
need to host certain servers internally for
regulatory, legal, or other reasons, I feel
that externally hosted services are the
future of business computing. This argument
runs right to the heart of the “Does
IT Matter?” discussion raised by Nicholas
G. Carr in his book Does IT Matter? Information
Technology and the Corrosion of
Competitive Advantage (Harvard Business
School Press, 2004). The move to cloudbased
services won’t diminish our reliance
on Microsoft servers or change the need
for IT pros to be fluent with these products.
But it will change how we access these
technologies. The future of computing is
distributed, and Microsoft clearly understands
that. If you’re on the fence about
self-hosting any of the servers included in
Microsoft Online Services, or are worried
about future upgrades and migrations, you
should investigate this solution. It signals a
sea change in the way that enterprise-class
server solutions are delivered to companies
and their employees.