Source : australianit

GOOGLE has finally removed the beta tag from a slew of applications, including Gmail and Docs, in a bid to woo large corporate clients.

The software giant hopes the move will convince Microsoft and IBM customers to switch to Google Apps Premier Edition, comprising Gmail, Docs, Calendar and Talk.
The Premier version is the paid service for Google’s online application suite for communication, productivity and collaboration — areas where Microsoft traditionally dominates with its Office and Outlook products, and where IBM has a legacy foothold with Lotus Notes.
The beta tags carried an air of unfinished business and the applications were perceived by some customers as not enterprise-ready.
Industry observers, analysts and users have long wondered why a product like Gmail, which has been around for more than five years, still carried a beta tag.
Other aspects of Gmail had evolved — when introduced in April 2004, it came with 1GB of storage space — the generous capacity offering even made global headlines.
Today, new Gmail users receive 7.3GB straight off the bat for the standard version. Premier edition users get 25GB of storage.
Google Apps senior product manager Rajen Sheth admitted that being in beta was a disadvantage in some cases as potential customers hardly gave Google Apps a look-in.
Google hopes to change that perception by removing with the move, he said.
"Google Apps is scalable to any business size; it already has 1.75 million businesses on it but we realise there’s more scope for growth," Mr Sheth said.
More features for IT administrators have also been added to the mix.
Email delegation will allow people to screen and send email on behalf of others while a feature called email retention will give administrators the tools to establish policies for when emails can be purged.
With email, Google is taking aim at entrenched Microsoft Exchange/Outlook and IBM Lotus Notes customers, he said.
"We’re on an even keel with them. We’re going to be very aggressive at marketing Google Apps to enterprise customers," Mr Sheth said.
He believes the economic climate presented a good opportunity for Google Apps to sell well.
"The cost factor for Google Apps is now even more appealing than ever before," Mr Sheth said.
Citing Microsoft as an example, he said Google’s offerings were one third or less the price of Windows products.
Google, he said, was also faster at innovating compared with Microsoft.
"We continue to innovate at a much quicker pace. If you look at our search functionality within Gmail or how we’ve enabled people to work on multiple documents at the same time, these are just examples of how we lead the market with innovation."
In Australia the paid version has hundreds of customers with thousands of users, a Google spokeswoman said.
The company hopes to replicate its success with Fairchild Semiconductor, which decided to migrate from a Notes environment to Google Apps.
Fairchild hopes to save $US500,000 per annum by moving its 5500-odd users off the old platform, Google said. 
The migration was completed in a mere three weeks, a feat Mr Sheth credited to the company’s cloud computing approach to hosting enterprise software.
"Unlike the old days there’s no need to spend resources and time on installing many servers just to migrate to a different email platform," he said.
Cloud computing is slowly gaining traction amongst traditional users of software. The federal government is looking at software-as-a-service with extra security precautions dubbed the "protected cloud" that could work for selected applications.

"Industry has been telling us what they could do for us, and some participants have talked about things like cloud computing," said John Sheridan, Australian Government Information Management Office business improvement manager.
"Of course, we have to protect all our information in accordance with privacy and security rules, but I am aware that a range of providers already have appropriate security in their offerings, so we’re looking at the options."

Category: GMail, News

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