Microsoft is planning to port Microsoft Office to the Apple Ipad. They are also planning to release a new edition of Office for OS X Lion next year.
This makes a lot of financial sense as the Ipad is the dominant Tablet in the market today.
I don’t know, the whole thing does seem to reinforce how much of a risk Microsoft is taking with Windows 8. If Windows 8 is not the wild runaway hit that people expect, Microsoft will probably be relegated back to the land of regular enterprise software development.
As I described in this post, enterprise apps make up the bulk of Microsoft’s profit so they have to continuously keep their eyes on the prize…
A quote from the daily article
Office is one Microsoft’s biggest sellers, second only to Windows. In 2011, the software suite should earn more than $15 billion in revenue, according to Business Insider. By branching out to new platforms — like the iPad — that number should only grow.
Besides Office, Microsoft is betting heavily on the next version of its flagship product, Windows 8, which, with its graphically focused Metro interface, has proven controversial. If it flops, the company’s fiscal future could rest on the performance of Office. Spreading Office to new platforms therefore makes a lot of sense for Microsoft.
