Microsoft Office for iPad announcement, live from San Francisco
(Thanks for joining us and bearing with our liveblog hiccups! Meanwhile, the rest of our team is over at Moscone Center following along with the Macworld/iWorld keynote session!)
(So, Office looks pretty good — but has the ecosystem moved on past Office for iPad users? We'll see... –MR)
(Nadella is wrapping up.)
We want our applications to run cross-platform great. We're not holding anything back. What motivates us is the reality of our customers. (not fear/guarding turf, is the implication. –MR)
You'll hear more about the innovations/intersection between mobile and cloud. How does Windows integrate here? More soon.
Enterprise Mobility Suite manages complexity of a heterogenous environment "Enables IT to be heroes because they enable their users."
For Office365, building a great user experience. Rich developer surface area, so they can go after a very wide opportunity.
10:30 Nadella back onstage. "Great focus and great care to make sure Office on every device shines through."
10:28: Moving on to developer audience. Showing DocuSign on iPhone integrated with Azure AD and Office365.
10:24 Now showing the Windows Azure AD application integrations, with SSO and two-factor auth. (You can tell by the volume of typing in the room that this does not have the crowd appeal of the iPad info. –MR)
10:22 Now showing the enterprise management portal for mobile devices. Can manage your connected devices from a browser. (Similar to MDM offerings from JAMF, AirWatch, etc.)
FREEMIUM MODEL for read-only access; with Office 365 subscription, you get full edit.
(These apps have a menu bar. Really quite intriguing. –MR)
PowerPoint: Lots of expectation of people presenting on the iPad — transitions and effects preserved. Annotations and laser-pointer options too.
Unique to Office on the iPad are chart suggestions — using my data, with a preview of what it's going to look like. "This is not the ported Windows or Mac app, or the iPhone app."
10:18 Excel has a custom numeric keyboard.
10:16 am: Simultaneous multiple users editing a doc in OneDrive.
Can also be confident that everything is going to look like we want it, and fidelity across devices.
Showing Word working with photos in native iPad mode.
11 am PT today Word, Excel and Powerpoint go live in the App Store for users.
9:58AM sorry for the massive image.
9:58AM Themed M&Ms and pillows seem to indicate an Office theme... :)
9:58AM Themed M&Ms and pillows seem to indicate an Office theme... :)
We're going to be live at Microsoft's announcement at One Kearny in San Francisco! Join us at 10 am PT/1 pm ET for updates and insights from the event.
You can read more about the anticipated topic (Office for iPad!) in our preview post here. Microsoft is also webcasting the session here.


