Microsoft releases SharePoint, Office 2010 and announces free online version of Word

May 12, 2010 — 10:12am ET | By Ron Miller

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Web Content Management
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Tony Byrne
Microsoft Office
Office 2010
SharePoint 2010

It's a big week for Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), that's for sure. We'll be seeing new versions of SharePoint 2010 and Office 2010 this week. After months of hearing about these packages, it will be nice to finally see what the final products look like and if they live up to the pre-release hype. This is especially true for SharePoint, which is a popular package, yet one that remains something of an enigma.

Tony Byrne had an interesting post on The Real Story blog this morning. He acknowledges that there are lots things to like in SP2010, but he also points out what he considers big weaknesses around web content management and social tools. He believes that Microsoft's development cycle is too slow to keep up with a market that is changing very quickly in these areas, and he encourages people to have a healthy dose of skepticism around what you are hearing. All of this makes sense to me.

Meanwhile, Microsoft is trying to engage Google's (NASDAQ: GOOG) consumer market by announcing that even while Office 2010 will be hitting the shelves this week, Redmond will be providing a free version of Word online. MSNBC points out that Microsoft probably won't be giving online users a terribly feature-rich offering, not wanting to undercut its extremely lucrative Office software market. According to the MSNBC post, Office accounted for 29 percent of Microsoft's revenue and 51 percent of its operating income last quarter. But at the same time, Microsoft believes it has to engage users in other ways and if that means providing some free online tools, so be it.

This is a pivotal week for Microsoft. If SharePoint and Office sell well, it will bode well for the company moving forward, but if they lag for some reason, it could be a big blow.