While I spend most of my time (and most of this blog) discussing Office for business use, in the lead up to launch I’ve been working with the extended Office team here in Australia. To shed some light on the Office 2010 retail lineup today’s guest blogger is Tina Flammer, Microsoft Australia’s Office Consumer Product Manager:

Over the weekend Office 2010 reached the important engineering milestone known as RTM (release to manufacture), meaning that the code is final and ready to be pressed.  For more information on RTM you can visit the Office Engineering blog.  In line with this product milestone, we’ve also made public the pricing of Office 2010 in Australia.

Before you scroll to the pricing chart there’s some information about the different versions I’d like to share.  Firstly, you’ll be happy to know that Office Home and Student 2010 boxed product allows usage on up to three PCs. This was also available in Office 2007.

We’ve also introduced a new way for people to buy Office – the Product Key Card.  The Product Key Card is a single license card that gives you an easy activation mechanism to unlock Office 2010 software that will come preloaded on new PCs from major PC manufacturers. If you buy a PC with the pre-loaded image of Office 2010 suites you’ll be able to purchase the Product Key Card for one of the three Office 2010 suites and use the product key to install and activate the pre-loaded image, without inserting a disc.

Product Key Cards make installation fast and easy because no DVD is required. It is also a more environmentally friendly purchase option and has a lower price point. However, when comparing the boxed price to the key card price below, keep in mind that usage rights for Office Home and Business and Office Professional boxed product allow installation on two PCs while the Product Key Card can only be used for a single installation.

Office 2010 Australian Recommended Retail Prices

The above table covers Office 2010 SKUs that will be available at retail in Australia.

You’ll notice that the SKU line up is very simple.  We reduced the number of SKUs available at retail from five down to three. The two SKUs that we’ve removed from retail are Office Standard and Office Ultimate. The other good news is that Office 2010 Home and Business, which replaces Office 2007 Small Business, is $370 less expensive while having a comparable application line up – the difference being that Publisher in 2007 has been replaced by OneNote in 2010.

Regarding the other two SKUs, the pricing for Office Home and Student 2010 and Office Professional 2010 remains the same as the pricing for Office Home & Student 2007 and Office Professional 2007. We provide recommendations to our retail partners in terms of a Recommended Retail Price (RRP), however each retailer makes its own pricing decisions and the RRP is only a guide. 

For those who wish to be among the first to own Office 2010, there is a pre-order program available at: http://store.microsoft.com/OfficePreorder

Tina Flammer – Office Consumer Product Manager, Microsoft Australia

* The recommended retail price for Product Key Card for Office Home & Business 2010 was originally listed as $269.00 - however the correct pricing for Office Home & Business 2010 is $279.00 as now listed.  Apologies for this error.