“A top Microsoft Corp executive side-stepped questions on Tuesday about any plans the software maker may have to bring its Office suite of applications to Apple Inc’s iPad,” Reuters reports.
“”We don’t take it from the point of view, ‘Do we need to have the PC software that’s running on every single device?,’ we look very much at ‘What is the experience that we are looking to have on those devices,'” said Kurt DelBene, head of Microsoft’s Office unit, asked about Office on the iPad at the Morgan Stanley technology investor conference in San Francisco, which was Webcast,” Reuters reports. “DelBene, who took over leadership of Office from Stephen Elop who left to lead phone maker Nokia in 2010, did not directly address putting native versions of Office applications on the iPad, a subject Microsoft has steered clear of in public.”
“Microsoft does offer native iOS versions of some Office applications, including its OneNote note-sharing software, Lync communication suite and SharePoint collaboration site, as well as its SkyDrive online storage service,” Reuters reports. “But the more than 100 million iPad owners, many of whom want to bring their devices to work, have to use the limited online versions of desktop staples Word, Excel and PowerPoint.”
MacDailyNews Take: Wrong, as usual, Reuters: iPad users can use iOS-native Pages (US$9.99), Numbers ($9.99) and Keynote ($9.99). Microsoft’s bloated, over-priced, insecure Office is far from the only game in town, despite what Microsoft and idiotic media outlets want the ignorati to believe.
Reuters reports, “Asked by one investor at the conference when he would be able to use Excel on his iPad, DelBene instead pointed the questioner toward Microsoft’s own Surface RT and Surface Pro tablets and urged him to use Web-based versions of Office apps.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: We like your strategy, Microsoft. We like it a lot:
That’s right, that pink color you see for “Windows Mobile Tablet” appears only in the graph’s key. Sales numbers are too small for anything to appear in the actual chart. Have fun selling your 12 copies of Office for tablets, you perpetual idiots.
Poor choice of colors on that graph, IMHO.
Want MS Office for iOS? Tough crap, go buy a surface. Brilliant strategy Microslut….nobody cares anyway about your crapulastic unproductive office suite. I wouldn’t infect my ipad with it even if you paid me a grand……
You mean:
“DelBene instead pointed the questioner toward Microsoft’s own Surface RT and Surface Pro tablets and urged him to use Web-based versions of Office apps.” That is not a very brilliant strategy. Microsoft has become irrelevant as an office suite and I wouldn’t even remotely consider putting it on my iPad.
Go on iTunes and find the CloudOn app. Full version of Microsoft Office is available through this app. I have been working with it for the last few weeks.
Office sucks, but it is essential. That’s why its competition falls short. Outside of Excel, its parts are almost interchangeable.
However, because of Excel and a few functions in Word, it is essential. And, Apple’s offerings are only good for casual use.
Office will be on the iPad soon enough, because that’s where the money is.
good take MDM its amazing the arrogence of big business especially those in the loser’s seat !
That graph appears to be replicants of iOS giving the finger to the others…
Sorry, MDN, but I’ve got to call you on this one 😉 That graph is of activations, not sales. Oh, and there is at least *space* on the chart for Surface/WinMobi8/RT/BusinessPremiumEdition. It’s right between each grouping of the other products.
Looking at that horrid graph maybe MDN should be using office lol
Cut the BS, pleeze. Pages, numbers etc are NOT Office progs nor do they operate as such. I have been astride BOTH PC and MAC worlds since 1990: I do legal work in Office and edit video in FCP on Mac. I own an iPad 1 and 2 and have given up trying to do Office-type work on them. I just bought a Surface Pro–to replace my failed 6 year old laptop–and I could not be more satisfied (from the perspective of an Office road warrior)…
MarkS,
“Cut the BS, pleeze. Pages, numbers etc are NOT Office progs nor do they operate as such.” Actually they do, for pretty much everything. I just open in pages or numbers and make changes and save to Microsoft cause other computers are so limited.
When Lion came out, my 2004 version of Office quit working. So, I end up converting back and forth. Its a little pain put I have not had to buy Office for Mac.
Just a thought.
The need for these monster applications is fading fast. I use Google Docs for everything light – about 90%. And Pages and Numbers for the rest.
There is no need for Word. And I hear Excel has some advanced functionality that have yet to be replicated elsewhere, but maybe your spreadsheets are just too complicated.
To bring Ofice to the iPad, Microsoft would have to know how to write a whole new version specifically for iOS. Since they don’t know HOW to write a full Office suite from scratch, they are likely trying to find buy company that makes a DOS/windoze emulator for IOS with which they can cobble together their full version and then delete OUT features that don’t work and package together as a new officePad app. Remember Microsoft has a few nice programs but they have few if any that they didn’t purchase from another company and then rebrand.
Seriously, office might be a good thing on iPad, but only if it ultimately contributes to Apple’s rise. Microsoft doesn’t have to lose for Apple to win! Steve wisely said that. But let’s face it, office is a complex bear. Apple’s failure to develop its own suite to a truly pro level has kept the door open for MS. It’s as tho they still have a financial agreement. Bring it on and let it succeed or fail on its own merits I say.
Someone needs to port LibreOffice/OpenOffice to the iPad ASAP so the users can tell the Redmond crew where to stuff it…