A new partner program, called the Professional Accountants Network, will build market buzz for Microsoft's forthcoming Small Business Accounting (SBA) product. Microsoft has also announced tentative pricing for a stand-alone product and how SBA will be bundled, but not priced, when included as part of Office.

Aimed at small businesses that need a minimum of professional help or customization in setting up their books, SBA bears a strong resemblance to other Office products and guides users through many common financial scenarios. However, the purchase of financial management software for a small business is often heavily influenced by the company's accountant, who typically provides basic advice and uses the customer's accounting data to prepare tax returns. In an effort to court accounting professionals, Microsoft has created a special partner program to reach these influential partners.

Program Details

Available today, even though SBA itself will not ship until Sept. 2005, the Microsoft Professional Accountants Network (MPAN) is part of Microsoft's larger Microsoft Partner Program and offers various accounting-related benefits, including the following:

• Free training, some of which counts toward continuing professional education credits for accountants, using self-paced tutorials, available online or by CD
• Access to Microsoft's Partner Channel Builder, which links partners with other partners who can help them develop new markets
• Access to special newsgroups and a portal
• Business-critical support (such as for a downed server).

For US$300, MPAN members get additional benefits, including:

• Microsoft's Action Pack, which normally costs US$300 by itself and contains internal use licenses for most of the company's business software
• Ten Small Business Accounting licenses and ten Office Small Business Edition licenses for internal use
• Free installation support and five free support incidents.

The company also plans to put in appearances at various accounting-related conferences, where it will distribute free copies of the software. For example, it had a presence at the 2005 New Jersey Accounting, Business & Technology Show, where it demonstrated the product and signed up accountants for free prerelease versions of the software.

Availability and Resources

Microsoft has also announced that SBA will be available in Sept. 2005 as both a stand-alone product, at an estimated retail price of US$200, and as part of Office Small Business Management Edition, whose price has not yet been announced. Other products in this Office bundle include Access, Excel, Outlook with Business Contact Manager, PowerPoint, Publisher, SBA, and Word.

Office Small Business Management Edition represents Microsoft's most complete bundle of Office components available through retail channels—it is basically Office Professional, which has an estimated retail price of US$499, plus SBA.

More details about SBA and MPAN are available at www.microsoft.com/accountants.

Small Business Accounting was described in "Small Business Accounting Fills Product Gap" on page 25 of the Dec. 2004 Update.