Google has announced an aggressive move into into the enterprise space by partnering with Capgemini, a consulting and outsourcing firm, to deliver Google Apps Premiere Edition as an Office alternative for customers. As is usual, Google will host the applications and data on its servers, while Capgemini will handle deployment, support, hardware, and security.
The outsourcing company isn't looking to transition existing customers away from Office, however. Capgemini primarily wants to offer Google Apps as a complementary service for companies with employees who are already using those services in "underground" or otherwise unsanctioned methods; this way, Capgemini can at least help secure the data and applications customers are using.
While there are obvious cost and performance advantages to doing things the Google Apps way, Microsoft has wasted no time in supplying a rebuttal to Google's announcement. In an email to ZDNet, Microsoft highlighted the downfalls of using Google's Enterprise offerings, including the company's tendency to leave apps in perpetual beta, the generic focus of their feature sets, and the true cost of making the sacrifices necessary to run Google Apps instead of—or even in addition to—Office.
Now Microsoft's response may feel a bit too knee-jerk for comfort, but the company does highlight some legitimate concerns about making such a significant transition. The promise of virtually hardware-agnostic apps that are managed by the 800lb gorilla that is Google can be alluring, but in this case, change might not be all it's cracked up to be for some businesses.
Ultimately, the true test of Microsoft's advice will be measured by how successful partnerships like Capgemini's are for Google.
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