"Third quarter 2003" and "this fall" have been replaced by the official date of October 21, as Microsoft sent the core products in its Office System -- including all editions of Microsoft Office 2003 and its components Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Outlook, Visio, FrontPage, and Publisher -- to manufacturing last week for a retail debut on the third Tuesday in October.
The software giant also took the wraps off of Office 2003 pricing, with estimated retail prices unchanged from those of corresponding Office XP bundles:
$149 for the Student and Teacher Edition including Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint;
$399 (upgrade $239) for the Standard Edition of the same four applications;
$449 (upgrade $279) for the Small Business Edition that adds Publisher 2003 and the new Business Contact Manager for Outlook;
and $499 (upgrade $329) for the Professional Edition that adds Access 2003 and additional support for XML and information-rights-management content creation and authoring.
Standalone program prices are also unchanged at $229 (upgrade $109) apiece for Word 2003, Excel 2003, Access 2003, and PowerPoint 2003. The standalone version of Outlook 2003 comes in at $109.
Microsoft's new XML forms creation and distribution package, InfoPath 2003, will retail for $199 in the standalone version; the new note-taking application OneNote 2003 has the same retail price, trimmed to $99 after a $100 mail-in rebate for qualifying North American customers. College students will also be able to buy OneNote for $49 in campus bookstores.
"The release to manufacturers of the Microsoft Office System is a milestone, not only in terms of the unprecedented development and testing work that went into it, but also because it enables customers to piece together data and operational aspects of their business where the real work happens: at individuals' desktops," says Steven Sinofsky, senior vice president of the Office (a.k.a. Information Worker) group at Microsoft. "The value of software is measured in how you use it, and never before has it been so easy for businesses to derive such incredible value from their software investments."
Two other versions of Office 2003 won't be found on retail shelves. The Professional Enterprise Edition, available only through corporate and academic volume-license programs, features professional versions of Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, and Access, as well as Publisher, Business Contact Manager, InfoPath, and value-added capabilities such as support for customer-defined XML schemas. The Basic Edition, available only through the OEM channel (PC vendor preinstallation), offers Word, Excel, and Outlook.
Special Server Connections
Microsoft says the core products' abilities can be extended in Microsoft Office System solutions that take advantage of Exchange Server 2003, Office SharePoint Portal Server 2003, Office Live Meeting, and Office Live Communications Server 2003. The mix of client- and server-based technology lets users enjoy deeper collaboration capabilities and communication tools such as live chats within the familiar Office applications.
When asked whether businesses are likely to be willing to invest in software upgrades in today's tight economy, Sinofsky says, "We certainly appreciate the pressures our customers are feeling in the current economy, and the tough criteria they must consider in making any expenditure decision. But in any economy, successful companies appreciate that sometimes the best way to save or make money is to spend money. Yes, deploying the Microsoft Office System would represent an investment for our customers, but I would urge them to look at the benefits they gain in terms of increased productivity and improved business efficiencies."
According to Sinofsky, the Microsoft Office System also offers great opportunities for industry partners such as independent software vendors and system integrators, such as creating platforms that leverage the new suite's XML capabilities to offer document- and form-based solutions that unlock data, providing desktop and notebook users with additional insight into enterprise server and other business information.
On the other hand, Microsoft says the Office 2003 upgrade has appeal for individual users as well as the enterprise, including a redesign of Outlook that makes it easier to organize today's mountains of e-mail and filter out most junk mail and the ability to burn PowerPoint presentations to a recordable CD or DVD.
