MS promises to take Office online

Microsoft has hit back at plans by Sun Microsystems to provide users with free internet access for its recently acquired StarOffice software, with promises to web-enable its Office productivity suite.

Steve Ballmer, president of Microsoft, unveiled the software giant's internet plans during a teleconference last week.

Although Ballmer did not provide many details or a timetable for the service, the announcement was seen as an attempt to develop what is rumoured to be a significant application hosting initiative by the vendor to be launched in October or November of this year.

Microsoft is expected to provide the service through several third parties and is reported to be in discussion with some ASPs to provide the online software for a per-user, per-month subscription fee.

"We will have a web-based Office productivity suite, no doubt about it," Ballmer said.

He insisted that the decision was not driven by Sun's plans: "We've been competing with StarOffice for years. Customers care about functionality and compatibility - StarOffice is not very good at either."

Research from Forrester suggests the application rental sector is projected to be worth $6.4bn by 2001. But Clive Longbottom, strategy analyst at Strategy Partners International, said the European ASP market will "struggle for a considerable time".

"A lot of customers do not understand the concept of an ASP. There is also a lack of cheap available bandwidth in Europe, both of which means the ASP environment has a long way to go," he said.

Microsoft and Sun are members of the ASP industry Consortium. The consortium aims to promote the benefits of the ASP industry.