Microsoft News Tracker

It’s somewhat anticlimactic since most of the details were released last month, but Microsoft Office Live became generally available in the USA today:

Microsoft Corp. today announced the availability of Microsoft^® Office Live in the United States at http://www.officelive.com after being in beta for nine months, and its free beta availability in Japan, France, the U.K. and Germany on Nov. 21. Customers can sign up for Office Live, a complete, affordable set of Internet-based software and services that help small businesses attract new customers, keep in touch with existing customers, generate repeat business, and easily manage their business while on the go.

Perhaps more interesting was the appeal to partners to build small business solutions using Office Live:

This new offering provides a wide range of opportunities for Microsoft Corp. partners and solution developers to tap into the most underserved segment of the IT market — small and home-based businesses — especially those with fewer than 10 employees, which represent nearly 20 million businesses in the United States, according to 2005 data from AMI Partners.

Office Live enables solution developers and service providers to cost-effectively drive revenue by targeting and acquiring new customers in the often untapped small-business segment. Partners in the retail and OEM segments can take part in pilot programs and influence the Office Live partner models for the future.

It seems that only a few third party developers have taken advantage of Office Live so far, but Microsoft would apparently dearly love to have more.

Just yesterday I took Neelie Kroes’ name in vain in connection with Microsoft interoperability and who pops up overnight but her nibs herself:

Brussels gave Microsoft a nine-day deadline yesterday to provide its rivals with outstanding details of its software systems or face fresh fines.

Neelie Kroes, the European Union’s competition commissioner, gave the world’s largest software group until next Thursday - Thanksgiving Day in America - to hand over all relevant information about the secret protocols behind its Windows operating system. Ms Kroes fined Microsoft €280.5m (£190m) in July for failing to comply with commission rulings and could now fine it up to €3m a day.

In an interview with the Guardian, she made plain that her patience had run out, saying: “I don’t have eternal life.” Microsoft, which is launching its upgraded Vista operating system this month, had promised to deliver all the details - to allow its systems to operate fully with rival networks - by July 19.

Ms Kroes said: “I am not impressed if someone says 90% of the information is already there when we need 100%. It’s a jigsaw and some parts are missing … In my opinion, this information should have been here a couple of months ago.”

There are further details and the Microsoft response in this AP story by Aiofe White, but it’s more of the same old song: the European Commission says they aren’t getting the required information and Microsoft says they are working hard to provide it.