Office 365

Microsoft Office 365 gives you access to the following services for a monthly fee. Microsoft runs the servers and supports you.

Exchange Server – Synchronize all of  your email, calendar and contacts between all of your devices. Share your calendar and contacts with your co-workers, see each other’s schedule.  Put Exchange at the center and point your PC, Mac, Entourage, iPhone, Android device, iPad, and any other device that supports ActiveSync at it, and you will have the experience that the largest corporations have come to rely on.

SharePoint Server – Organize your documents and company information in a meaningful way while making it avaialable to your users while remote and on the go. Tired of emailing documents back and forth and trying to reconcile the versions.  Create a company portal with knowledgebase and training materials to bring your new employees up to speed more quickly.

Lync Server – Replace your GoToMeeting costs in one fell swoop. Rather than having a seperate cost associated with GoToMeeting the Lync Server is included in Office 365 and allows you to hold remote meetings, webinars, and trainings. The instant messaging feature and presence information helps to keep a remote, mobile workforce feeling and acting like they are all in the same place.

It was not long ago that if you wanted the enterprise services of Exchange server or SharePoint, you needed to deploy a server at your location and have a skilled IT expert manage it for you.  That has all changed with the advent of cloud services and in particular with Microsoft’s entry into the service business.

It’s not all or nothing

Our experience has shown that not all things belong in the cloud, that rather a mixed environment is more strategic approach.  With Office 365 Microsoft has extended the ability to mix on site services with cloud services. One of the greatest advantages that we see is that a company can expand as needed without making large capital investments and can more quickly adapt to a changing marketplace.

We can help you to determine if  Office 365 is a good fit for you and assist you with making the transition.

The Cloud

The cloud  is more than a buzz word, but don’t be fooled, it’s been around longer than you think.  You’ve used the cloude everytime you’ve logged into Gmail, Hotmail, or Yahoo. The essence of the cloud is you are using services that are maintained by another company over the internet. For example, Gmail delivers email and calendaring services without having to run the servers yourself.