Google Gets one from Microsoft
While Duffbert and Ed discovered an interesting set of articles which you really must read, one thing was not discussed.
In this article from Cnet.com there is a little reference to Serena Software (800 users)
Just last week, Serena Software said it was switching to Google from Exchange in a move it said would save it $750,000 a year, according to several reports.
This equates to about $950 PER USER to make this move.
In an article in Eweek the explanation gets deeper, for $50/yr per user the cost for GAPE, the premier service
GAPE includes Gmail, Google's Postini messaging security software and 25GB of mailbox space, as well as greater uptime and 24/7 phone support. It also includes other Google productivity and collaboration applications, such as Google Docs word processing, spreadsheet and presentations, and Google's Sites wiki.
(I love the 25gb mailbox and who wouldn't?)
As noted in the article Serena is really only using Gmail right now because they have Sharepoint installed but are seeing a progression to the online apps. You will notice there is an implied additional expense if and when Serena moves the other 750 people to GAPE's sharing software. 50 are test users for now.
Google is learning to crawl and it's only a matter of time before they stand up and start running....possibly after your clients or organization or after Lotus and Microsoft's core clients.
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3 comments:
I think this can be a fantastic motivator to get more people thinking cloud and SaaS. While I can't say that a local client will be eradicated in the very near future, at least the environment that I'm part of is starting to drift to more service based items and less local deployments.
I still believe the Cloud is just another term for ASP, Hosting, etc..BUT this may level a playing field in a way Microsoft never envisioned and Google is naturally the leader in this game.
As a point of clarification, Google Sites is included in GAPE. There is no additional cost to add Google Sites, Google Forms, Google Talk, Start Pages, etc. to the use of GMAIL for paid corporate users.
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