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Window closing on Office 2003 | |
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||
| Time: 14:42 EST/19:42 GMT | News Source: The Register | Posted By: Andre Da Costa | ||
|
Microsoft is facing an uphill battle to push copies of Office 2003 on customers and its ISV partner ecosystem, ahead of next year's predicted launch of Office 12. Office 2003 appears to be falling behind in targeted sales for this point in the product's lifecycle, according to Microsoft's own internal figures and guidelines. Just 15% of PCs are running Office 2003, two years into its life, with Office 12 - the next edition of Microsoft's ubiquitous suite - now on the horizon. However, Microsoft traditionally expects between 50% and two thirds of customers to be running the previous version of Office when the new copy ships. During a recent press roundtable Chris Capossela, vice president for Microsoft's Information Worker product management group said that Microsoft is holding firm on these numbers, and expects two thirds of the 400m Office installation base will be running Office 2003 at the time when Office 12 ships. | ||
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| #1 By 8556 (12.207.222.2) at 7/21/2005 3:14:57 PM |
| Microsoft must be planning on giving away copies a couple of million copies of Office 2003 if they expect the user base to grow from 15% of 400 millions Office users today to over 50% by next year. Why would a happy pre-Office 2003 user spend money to upgrade when the older versions do everthing they need? |
| #2 By 15406 (216.191.227.90) at 7/21/2005 3:24:39 PM |
| Whetever features they add, it still won't matter. People only use 15% of what Office can do now. They aren't likely to upgrade just to get the new features that they still won't use. Office 95 was good enough for almost everybody. |
| #3 By 7760 (12.155.143.50) at 7/21/2005 3:34:54 PM |
| Outlook 2003 does have a few "original new features" in it; it's just that they're mostly for businesses, not your average family. Two of the most useful, off the top of my head, are RPC over HTTP and Cached Exchange Mode. If more administrators knew the benefits of 2003 for their jobs and their businesses, more businesses would ditch 2000, I'm sure. I would imagine that the business sector is where the majority of decision between 2000 and 2003 takes place, anyways, since most home users don't make a choice in that regard. |
| #4 By 37 (67.37.29.142) at 7/21/2005 4:34:00 PM |
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Hilton Corporation *just* upgraded to Office 2003.
I think MS expects those numbers to increase based on the license renewals that are pending from Office 2000/2002 which moves people into the Office 2003/Windows XP/2000/2003 requirements. |
| #5 By 8556 (12.207.222.2) at 7/21/2005 4:46:34 PM |
| Brian: I don't think MS will achieve the numbers they targeted (50-65% of the 400 million existing worldwide MS Office users) by next year. I can't see 150 million corporate users upgrading to Office 2003 when Office 12 (or 2006) will be available shortly. Business cash flow is tighter than the last couple of years due to increased travel/shipping/maintenance costs. What is the incentive to upgrade an Office program if you don't need to, or if forced to do so when there are free alternatives that are often "good enough"? |
| #6 By 2459 (69.22.124.157) at 7/21/2005 6:04:08 PM |
| I also think there are more incentives in waiting for Office 12. Since support has ended for NT4 and will end for Windows 2000 deployments shortly, many shops are probably holding upgrades until a platform shift. Office 12 will have assured compatibility with Longhorn as well as new functionality. |
| #7 By 415 (69.67.200.50) at 7/21/2005 6:46:24 PM |
|
Frontpage 2003 and Outlook 2003 were both very big upgrades, and Onenote was a great additon to the product line. However, the core products (Word, Excel, PP, Access) didn't seem to get quite as much attention.
Unfortunately, I think the problem was that Microsoft didn't allow enough time between releasing Office XP and Office 2003. So if you look at the cumulative totals of Office 2002 (XP) and Office 2003 licenses, they're probably about right were they should be heading into Office 12's release. I think if Microsft is going to keep customers upgrading in the long term, they're going to have to roll features and upgrade into the Office product via service packs or feature packs, and push the major releases out to a minimum of 3 years. I use Valve Software (Half-Life) as a perfect example of the type of customer loyalty that sticking with a product can develop. |
| #8 By 3653 (68.52.165.46) at 7/21/2005 9:42:20 PM |
| Either the current stat (15%) is off... or the goal is off. Something is wrong with our info, I think. |
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