Google Office is not a solution. It is merely a set of virtual tools.
Can a small business afford to give up the high-level of functionality and integration offered by Microsoft Office? If you tell your controller they can no longer merge AR letters with Dynamics, the sales manager they can't analyze CRM data using MapPoint and HR/Payroll the time clock data will need to be re-keyed, what do you think they will say?
Google is NOT providing 'free' applications because they are a philanthropic organization. They have a plan to monetize any hosted application suite through advertising and mining the data for aggregate trend data. The first reason should be enough to keep any smart business person away. The second reason, in light of recent AOL privacy revelations, should be enough to make you run!
Today’s small businesses are looking for solutions that help them compete more effectively in local as well as global markets. They can not afford to be hobbled by inferior applications that offer little more than virtualized versions of non-integrated 1980’s-vintage shareware.
I look forward to the day when we can offer our clients hundreds; if not thousands of small business applications, designed to work together in a virtual cafeteria suite, with the same tight integration available in the networked Windows environment of today. Until then, we will continue to encourage companies that want virtual access to their systems to use solutions like
Terminal Services and Go-To-My-PC, complimented with web-based collaboration tools like SharePoint and Groove
