Office, System Center for Nokia

An expanded alliance between Nokia and Microsoft will bring Office Mobile applications and Microsoft systems management technology to Nokia’s phones for businesses. The deal announced in Aug. 2009 could benefit organizations by bringing more devices to market that can handle Office documents offline and that can be centrally managed with Microsoft tools. However, the deal also weakens the unique position of Microsoft’s Windows Mobile device platform, which competes with Nokia’s.

Beyond Exchange E-Mail to Document Editing

The most unusual aspect of the deal is that Microsoft and Nokia agreed to bring Microsoft’s Office Mobile applications to run on Nokia E-series phones and subsequent devices intended for business. Notably, editions of Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and OneNote will enable users of these devices to view and edit local copies of Office documents, including e-mail attachments. Up to now, these Office Mobile applications have been available only for Windows Mobile devices; other devices have had to depend on third-party software to handle Office documents. Mobile device users probably won’t work on long documents for extended periods, but might use the applications for note taking, commenting, simple data entry, and light editing, particularly as devices with larger multitouch screens become the norm. Nokia devices will also get an updated version of Microsoft’s Office Communicator Mobile instant messaging and presence client, which is already available for Nokia S40 and S60 phones (as well as the Motorola Razr V3 series).