Google Apps Premier Edition


This is just a mini-post to aggregate the plethora of commentary surrounding the announcement of Google Apps Premier Edition.  Phrases like “in direct competition with Microsoft Office” abound, but overall it’s apparent that there are still a tremendous amount of questions surrounding the maturity level of the application suite.

Here’s a bit of what’s being said:

The question of competitive landscape comes up quite a bit in these discussions.  Is Google Apps Premier Edition as a whole product actually in direct competition with MS Office? Don Dodge offers some very good examples of why it is not. It seems that Google Apps’ aggregate features fall in between the intentional sparcity of the 37signals collaboration suite, and the common robustness and sheer power of MS Office.  As Google starts to elbow its way into the market MS is in a position to adapt and continue to innovate, it’s companies like Zoho and 37signals that should really be concerned (not to mention the price comparisons - $50 per user/per year for Google Apps Premier vs. $149 per user/ per month for 37signals’ BaseCamp).

What are your thoughts?  Where does Google’s play sit in the landscape of enterprise communication and collaboration?

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February 22nd, 2007
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Comment Number:
1
Written by:
Abraham Sultan
Posted on:
February 22, 2007 at 9:56 am

Hey Matt, Good point.

Everybody is focused on how Google is going to impact Microsoft’s market share when in reality it is far from coming close to that. The little guys should be the ones concerned as Google’s products align more with their target market.

If anything the Google apps could still from the ocassional MS Office Home user but as far as the Enterprise user it has a very very very long way to go.

Comment Number:
2
Written by:
Lincoln Murphy
Posted on:
February 22, 2007 at 1:13 pm

The fact that this offering is targeted at “enterprise” users is certainly a fantastic sign of the times… Google *thinks* enough of the Enterprise SaaS market to try to move into the dominant space of Office(-style) productivity software. I think this seriously helps our case as a SaaS vendor looking to replace “legacy” on-premises apps in large enterprises.

What will the *actual* impact of this be? That doesn’t matter as much as the perceived impact. The actual impact will probably be Microsoft’ Live Office that they’ve been sitting on until Google announced their suite.

- Lincoln

Comment Number:
3
Written by:
Abraham Sultan
Posted on:
February 22, 2007 at 1:37 pm

Lincoln you bring up a very good point.

Most likely the case of whose market share will be impacted is irrelevant compared as to what this means for the SaaS industry as a hole. The question of “if SaaS” is gone and we’ve known it for a good time now, the new question is “when SaaS”; and moves like this one validate it more and more.

The news about Google is great validation for SaaS and also Enterprise SaaS; this is greater enhanced with Salesforce.com quarter release that shows their booming growth in the large enterprise space.

- Abe

Comment Number:
4
Written by:
Matt Ammerman
Posted on:
February 22, 2007 at 2:00 pm

Lincoln, great point.

When the giants make a move or show progress as Abe points out, changes happen (and aggregate progress is made) - both from the reaction of other giants, and the scurry of the smaller players trying to remain relevant and competetive.

And you’re right, the fact that “enterprise” users are the target here means more for immediate mindshare impact than what the overall impact may actually be on the enterprise SaaS market. The notion of enterprise SaaS will gain more ‘face time’ in the industry, which is of course good for us all.

As you said, Google’s announcement if nothing else has served to catalyze the notion of enterprise SaaS.