Microsoft wants to keep consumers away from Google Apps

It's no secret that Microsoft sees Google as a competitor when it comes to mobile devices, and has never hesitated to make that clear. On the other hand, Microsoft is also quick to criticize Google publicly when it comes to its best-known office suite, leading many to believe that Microsoft and its core products have no viable competitor. But apparently this is not quite true, as Microsoft has reportedly formed a team of "Google Competitors," whose sole purpose is to keep consumers away from Google Apps.

Microsoft definitely seems to be feeling the squeeze that Google Apps is creating, which can be seen from price cuts, reseller commissions and its overall sales strategy for Office 365. Today, Microsoft is launching the next generation of Microsoft Office, which is currently the company's golden egg hen (which currently earns more revenue than Windows sales), is focusing its business much more on coporative versions of Office.

In an effort to prevent Google from advancing, the "Google Competitors" team was created with the ultimate goal of stopping the growth of Google customers. Customers and businesses that have moved from Office to Google Apps have been receiving invitations from the so-called Google Competitors team, which appears to have been created in late 2011.

Office 365 is priced to be 50% more expensive than Google Apps, although Google Apps is a super cool Office. Dominion Enterprises, for example, reported that it paid $ 2 million a year on Microsoft products, but now only pays $ 200,000 per year for Google Apps. What a hell of a difference, isn't it?

Microsoft currently denies that Google is the reason for the company's recent initiatives, and while Google apparently does not cause significant damage to Microsoft Office (which currently has 90% market share for enterprise productivity software), Google is improving on this, and currently earns a third of half of new corporate customers who buy web-based software.

Gartner analyst Tom Austin summed it up well when he said:

"Suddenly this sounds very serious. By all accounts, (Microsoft) should sink Google, and they are not."

Microsoft has tried to counter this March's fall by offering up to 20% discounts to large companies and universities.

Today, Microsoft makes more money from Android than from its own mobile operating system, which is unbelievable when you think about the size of the company. On the other hand, it's good to see Google take back a slice of the pie by cutting where Microsoft makes the most money.

Image: Dashes

. (tagsToTranslate) Google (t) Google Apps (t) Microsoft (t) Office 365 (t) Marketplace