Google Woos Microsoft Office 365 Users With Free Workplace Apps

With Microsoft Office 365 catching up to Apps in the workplace in terms of cloud-based productivity services, Google is working hard to stay relevant in the enterprise.

"It's great to see a few assertive moves being made by Google to woo Microsoft enterprise clients to [Google Apps for Work]", said Sawhney. That's why Google is offering the enterprise edition of Google Apps for free for the duration of existing contracts.

Aragon Research analyst Jim Lundy noted Google is confident about its software's performance in sidetracking Microsoft's products, and disclosed customers pay between $12 to $20 under contracts that run for several years to use Microsoft's software. When asked, Microsoft did not want to reveal the overall amount of people who uses their product.

Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) has announced that their Apps for Work is now free for a few clients in an attempt to make it easier for businesses to switch over, especially those who have an ongoing commitment with another software provider such as Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT).

The offer is now only available in the U.S. and Canada but plans to roll out the offering to Google's global market are under way. Approximately one million businesses are paying to use Apps for Work, Google said.

Google Apps for Work, which includes Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, and Drive along with calendaring and communications tools like Gmail, Hangouts, Calendar, and more, as well as an IT dashboard for management, starts at $5 per user per month, or increases to $10 per user per month for unlimited storage space and "Vault", a system for eDiscovery of emails, chats, docs and files. As Weingerger notes, resellers are usually trusted IT contractors that help set up a business' technology infrastructure. And it says it will chip in on a few of the deployment costs following the earlier contract's expiration, by also connecting the new customer with a Google for Work Partner.

It appears to be struggling to hold its own against Microsoft. Google's new tactics, which won't come cheap at least in the short run, are a clear signal that they are fully committed to competing with Microsoft and not letting them amass a substantial lead.