Office 15 aka Office 2013 is rumoured to be officially announced by Steve Balmer tomorrow.  Here is what I would like to see from the event:

  • A clear understanding of how Office needs to evolve on mobile and non Windows devices
Not so fast…no detail on iOS and Android for Office but my gut feel tells me that the ‘Best on Windows 8′ line that was spun today is setting up MS to say consumers can have iOS if you want a ‘sub-standard’ experience.  In addition the release notes of Lync 2013 confirms extensive support for iOS, Android and Mac.
  • A corollary of the above – how does Office live in the touch enabled world
Interesting take on touch.  MS not only confirmed touch but went further with their opinion that a stylus pen will work well in the enterprise and with Onenote 2013.
  • Office 365 – what a statement it would be for Office 365 if Balmer announced release of Office 2013 and on the release day all Office 365 customers on the right plan (E3) receive instant access
 Office 365 2013 is available for preview right now.  Good work MS.
  • Greater integration of the server Office products of Lync, Sharepoint and Exchange into the desktop/mobile Office client
No great detail about this today.  The presentation was relatively short and this type of detail didn’t stand a chance of being released.
  • Can Microsoft make Office social and maintain relevance
They are certainly trying by having new social features in Office 365 and a new consumer version of Office 365 and SkyDrive – again more to be found in future releases
  • Finally Skype and Yammer integration, how and when.

Skype integration is confirmed with Lync 2013 – although not enabled yet I believe.  Initially it will be IM and peer to peer voice but I assume this will improve over time.   Yammer is interesting.  Office 365 2013 seems to have a very similar feature set with ‘Newsfeed’ but Yammer did get a mention in the presentation today at the very highest level.