Windows 7 & Office 2010 To help Businesses Perform better

We caught up briefly with Chris Adams, Office Product Manager at Microsoft UK, between two events in the wake of Microsoft's biggest announcement of the year yet, the official launch of Microsoft Office 2010 and Sharepoint 2010.

We had a quick chat with him over the two products and why people need to take heed, why are the main features of the business suite and how businesses can mix Office 2010 and Windows 7 to perform better.

(ed : Find more about Office 2010 launch events here).

What are the reasons why businesses should upgrade from Office 2003 or 2007 to 2010? 

We developed the next version of Office products in response to a shift in how people and businesses use technology today. The line between home and work has blurred, so people want more choice and flexibility in how, where and when they work.

The next wave of Office-related products will help people address these challenges. With Office 2010 we are giving people a familiar interface across PCs, mobile phones and browsers to make it even easier for them to create, communicate and collaborate from any location. 

IT professionals, in particular, are challenged to deliver business value to their companies while continuing to decrease their costs. In addition, businesses need to comply with new and increasing regulatory mandates and security protocols, while also focusing on driving efficiencies.

IT professionals will benefit from a choice of new delivery options as well as from improved management options to better control costs, and enhanced security across all locations.

And through our integrated infrastructure, businesses can more easily deploy, manage and help secure corporate assets and comply with government regulations.  

Developers will benefit from investments we’re making on our platform that will, in turn, reduce their development cycles and improve application interoperability.

We are working on open APIs and deep support for industry standards, and at the same time, we are expanding our developer tool support, all toward making developers’ lives significantly easier. 

Office 2010 is the second major Microsoft product to launch within one year (after Windows 7). How can pairing the two help businesses perform better? 

Although Office 2010 is built to work with many different versions of Microsoft Windows, innovations in Windows 7 offer great productivity enhancements to Office 2010. 

Jump Lists, which are new in Windows 7, provide shortcuts and instant access to the files, commands, and suites of applications you use every day, including Office 2010.

With Snap, comparing documents or taking notes while reading through a spreadsheet or presentation is easy. Drag one document to the left side of your screen and the other to the right, and Windows 7 will automatically adjust the window size to perfectly align the documents for a side-by-side view. 

Office 2010 users will feel right at home when using Windows 7 and Windows Live applications such as Paint, WordPad, and Movie Maker. The consistent use of the Ribbon user experience across Windows and Office makes it easy to discover features and be more efficient. 

No more juggling separate folders for your laptop or desktop when you travel. By using Office 2010 with Windows 7, you can work seamlessly across different PCs as you travel and keep all your work in sync.