Google to offer “Google Office”

Aaron Ricadela of InformationWeek writes:

Google this week will launch Google Apps for Your Domain, a software bundle aimed at small and midsize companies. The free, ad-supported package combines Google’s E-mail, calendar, and instant messaging with Web site creation software. It will be hosted in Google’s data center, branded with customers’ domain names, and packaged with management tools for IT pros.

That’s the first step. Later this year, Google plans to add its Writely word processor and Google Spreadsheets to the suite, build online collaboration features that work across its applications, and market the whole package to large companies for a fee. Google will include IT-friendly features such as APIs, directory-server integration, guaranteed performance levels, and telephone tech support.

Instead of trying to displace the hundreds of millions of copies of Office installed on business PCs, Google will try to snare users once they start sharing the Word and Excel files they’ve created. “The right way to view Writely and Google Spreadsheets, especially in the context of a larger business, isn’t necessarily as a replacement for Word or Excel,” says Matt Glotzbach, head of enterprise products at Google. “They’re the collaboration component of that.”
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Google’s plans include prompting people who send Microsoft Office documents using Gmail to translate those files into Google’s formats for editing on Google.com, presumably in a forum where ad space is up for sale. Gmail messages that include attached files currently prompt users with links to download the documents or view them on the Web. Glotzbach envisions a third link to edit the documents online and generate E-mail to other users in a group when the edits are done. Writely can read files created by Microsoft Word, and Google Spreadsheets can read and create Excel files and formulas, though it’s unable to handle more complex Excel functions such as macros.

“That’s a brilliant idea, because it would allow them in a way to shanghai Microsoft’s corporate customers into the Google fold,” says Tim Bajarin, president of consulting company Creative Strategies. Google is increasingly using its applications to entice Internet users to store more personal and business data on Google’s servers, Bajarin says. There, the company can correlate the information with online advertisements users are most likely to click on.

It already does this with apps like Gmail and the Google Desktop search tool. But there’s much room for expansion. In June, it introduced the ability to store digital photos managed in Google’s desktop Picasa software on company servers. Bajarin predicts hosted storage for digital music and other files can’t be far off. “Their goal is to be the hosted back end for your digital life,” he says. “Microsoft will fight tooth and nail to keep this from happening to their corporate apps.”