BPOS became 'UNION' becomes Office365

Oct 19th 2010 Microsoft Unveiled the new name of their Microsoft Online proposition formely known as BPOS and codename 'UNION'. The new Name of the suite is Office365 and since the announcement a lot of content came available. Content about features, prices, markets, beta availability and roadmaps beyond.

Roadmap
The Beta came available for 13 countries/regions. These countries/regions include: Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong SAR, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Singapore, Spain, United Kingdom, and the United States. The Netherlands is not amoung the lucky ones, looking at the roadmap I think a safe bet is that it will be general available within 6 mounths.

Notice that the existing customers (BPOS) will have to wait a little longer until transitions of services are available.


Do you feel lucky?
Notice that the existing customers (BPOS) will have to wait a little longer until transitions of services are available. So are those new customers lucky or why are existing customers sorry they have to wait a little longer?

Microsoft explains these questions as follows:

Q: Is Office 365 still BPOS?
A: Office 365 is the introduction of new online services and capabilities, new user experiences, and new online platform capabilities related to the introduction of new underlying “2010” server software into Microsoft Online Services datacenters as well as other major new service and platform investments. The name may be new and includes new offerings, but you are subscribed to the same service – just significantly enhanced. It will just give you a lot more features and functionality once you make the transition.

Q: I am not on BPOS now. Should I wait for Office 365?
A: The benefits of Microsoft Online Services are realized as soon as services are deployed, whether on BPOS or Office 365. Customers who do decide to purchase BPOS now should deploy BPOS with the new system requirements to make the transition experience as smooth as possible.

So Microsoft explains that Office365 differs from BPOS and that all these benefits will be deployed when available. Even when you feel like going online, do it now, no need to wait...

I have no experience with the transition from BPOS to Office365, besides a few from Microsoft nobody has. Still I wonder if this is entirely thrue. There are some ´system requirements`?!?! and Microsoft has a Transition Checklist that looks quite straight forward.

The biggest defects of BPOS may be the biggest guarantee to successful transition.

BPOS ´defects´
BPOS is a productivity suite. In this package of functionality SharePoint plays a major role as it does in the on premise based functionality stack. In this package SharePoint online is based on the 2007 version also called MOSS. The biggest complaint from customers and even more the Microsoft Partner is that there are very limited options for customization available. The gap between the feature set available in the online version and MOSS2007 is huge.

Since the SharePoint2010 release last may became general available the differences between the two versions, made the demand to the release of BPOSv2 even bigger. SharePoint2010 is the 4th evolution of the platform. It's much more mature, but in relationship with SharePoint Online, it is developed with Online deployment as a starting point!

Since the MOSS2007 was not, Microsoft had a lot of problems deploying BPOS in a shared cloud environment (multi-tenant). So what is the effect of this mindshift to the cloud?

Office365
Office365 looks promising in this area. A lot not all features are available or are expected to become available shortly in the SharePoint Online version.

The feature set available to the end-user became very rich. Nice integration with the Office Webapps, full fidelity across devices, real WIKI everywhere and so on and on. Again more important is that the Microsoft Partner finally will be able to deploy their added value solutions on top of the platform.

The starting point to develop the platform with a multi-tenant cloud for the SharePoint2010 platform (and all other 'members' of WAVE14) changed the way resources are are used and managed. Simply said, a buggy application of one company cannot hurt another, not even when they are deployed in the same infrastructure.

Management capabilities are also available to administrators in SharePoint2010 Online. This 'feature' was just very limited available to the Microsoft Partner in BPOS.

BPOS became 'UNION' becomes ? -

During a webcast Microsoft Office Division will announce changes a lot of partners are waiting for a while now. My biggest disapointment during my visit to Microsoft World Partner Conference in Washington last summer was the lack of information in the area of BPOS or codename UNION.
My expectation was that the new name, functionality and more important the release dates would 've been unveiled during this biggest partner event of the Softies. Well the anouncement is there:


Announcement From Microsoft Office Division
Oct. 18, 2010


Microsoft Corp. will announce news from its Office Division, live from San Francisco via webcast, on Oct. 19 from 8 to 8:30 a.m. PDT. Check back here to watch the webcast live!

I do hope they will meet up the expectations.

The Cloud? Are you serious?

Microsoft is claiming to be a very seriouse player in The Cloud Business. The latest campaign with a kickof at the Washington University by Steve Balmer is called 'We are all in'. So what is the status and where are they going?

Microsoft is well known by most people. Most of the people ever using a PC since about 1980 is a customer (paying or not) of this company. Most company's are using one or more software products of Microsoft. Over 6 million copy's of their most famous product Microsoft Office sold.

The world is changing

The way Microsoft is delivering their software to the users is changing. They do not actualy delivering software, but aiming to deliver services. Office delivered this way is called Office Web Apps. If you question the strategic move to The Cloud check out the succes: in the first 100 days it went live, Microsoft picked up 20 million users for Office Web Apps.

More changes

Another BIG online area of Microsoft is productivity - 'Business Productivity Online Service' or short BPOS. BPOS encompasses products like Exchange, SharePoint, Office Communication Server (OCS) and Forefront. Microsoft is preparing to move into the Wave 14 with BPOS (now called codename Union). Exchange and SharePoint will move to the 2010 version, OCS and Live meeting are becomming Linc and the Office Web Apps are added to the offering.
SharePoint 2010 is the 4th evolution of the product (products like Office are in their 10th or so) and is becoming very mature. Since the focus on online Microsoft decided to design and develop all of their products with The Cloud in mind.

Microsoft is expected to unveil more about the new name and changes in the new version Oktober 19th.

These changes are even more interessting for Microsoft partners because they will be able to add their added value solutions on top of the platforms and ship the total solution. Expectations are very high.

Are you serious?

So IS Microsoft serious? The focus on the online business is succesfull. BPOS has seen 3x growth this year, with now over 40 million paid seats. These seats are comprised of smaller businesses and many large enterprises. Well that's serious business.

Also Microsoft recognizes the importance of differentiation in the markets. Live@edu is The Cloud offering based on BPOS targetting the Educational market, BPOS Federal is aiming on the US governmental market. BPOS Federal is told to be more secure.

Are you secure?

To be able to claim this more secure environment Microsoft has added up the suite with a set of industry standards:

• International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 27001
• Statement on Auditing Standards (SAS) 70 Type I and Type II
• Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
• Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA)
• Title 21 CFR Part 11 of the Code of Federal Regulations
• Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2
• Trusted Internet Connections (TIC) compliance

If one desides to invest in such list of industry standard compliancy's this means they are pretty serious about their goal. BPOS Federal is available for US only. The list of additional industry standards apply to the normal BPOS offering.

The future of productivity - Roadmap announcements BPOS

Wave 14 to The Cloud

This year Microsoft is releasing the last new versions of their Wave 14 program. Lot's of their major server and client products have been updated with new functionality. More important ALL of them have been redesigned and developed with The Cloud in mind.

With the launch of Exchange, SharePoint and Office 2010 earlier this year, Microsoft began to work to update BPOS* with the new capabilities that these products deliver. Microsoft started with their biggest customers. They have dedicated cloud deployments and now are fully deployed on the 2010 wave products.

In the next update, Microsoft will bring decades of on-premise innovation to the cloud for the multitennant SKU as well. Functionalality will get very close to parity with our server solutions.

WPC10 announcements

During the last Microsoft World Partner Conference in Washington DC a few announcements were made about the Online Roadmap. Microsoft did not provide exact dates for these releases. Buzz is that a preview of the new BPOS offering before the end of this calendar year. I wonder if that will happen...
More accurate and a bit more likely is the estimated timeframe of the delivery of the updates to each of the managed services and new online platform capabilities within this fisical year (Jul '10 - Jun '11).

Microsofts call for action to partners and cutomers is to get ready for this wave and the 'online tranistion', to focus on Business Model transformation and getting customers ready and deployed.

What functionality to expect?

A Lot of sessions at the WPC covered cloud services and next wave BPOS (codename 'Union'). These slides from the slidedeck of session 'CLD09 The Future of BPOS: Next Generation of Microsoft Online Services' provide insight in the updates to come.

SharePoint Online
The functionalities in this slide give insight in what to expect, check the original deck for the detail slide or drop me a note.

Office Communications Server '14' Online
OCS on-premise will be released this fall. Most functionality will move to the online services during 2011. Do not expect to be released in the first update.

Exchange Online

These are three of the most important server products that will add a lot of functionality to the Microsoft Online offering and great opportunities to extend the business solutions that support productivity. Mind that all this functionality is delivered in a total productivity suite and combined with the office 2010 client software provide a great experience in a familiar environment for the end user. Office 2010 (Web Apps) is also part of the Online offering.

* BPOS (Business Productivity Online Services) or Microsoft Online Services is a proposition of Microsoft; Enterprise class software delivered via subscription services hosted by Microsoft and sold with partners