L1010761

Last week ChannelWeb noted Partners Hungry for Details on Microsoft's SaaS Plans and their hunger has hopefully been abated this morning at the WorldWide Partner Conference. Last year saw Steve Ballmer and other execs set the stage for the services era. I know many partners left last year feeling a little nervous about the changes afoot.

On a very basic level, partners selling Exchange on premise or hosted Exchange themselves felt Microsoft was about to start competing with them. I can see why that would be their initial conclusion but having talked to more partners this year, the tide is turning. Many can now see that this change that was widely perceived to be a Microsoft reaction to Google and others is in fact more a sign of the industry change. Driven by greater penetration of broadband the services era represents a real opportunity for many Microsoft partners. For those looking to build a solid annuity based revenue stream, Business Productivity Online could be a real boon. I think it’s also a harbinger of things to come when you look across the wider landscape of services and cloud computing.

So what did we announce today – or more specifically, what did Stephen Elop announce?

With Business Productivity Online Suite, partners now have another tool in their armoury to sell Exchange, SharePoint and OCS. When selling BPOS, they’ll be paid 12% in year 1 and 6% for every recurring year beyond that. For customers who want a quick turnaround and partners looking to lower their cost of sale on a standardised Exchange or SharePoint solution offering, this should be very attractive. It’s a terrific way to build an strong annuity business.

We also announced a “deskless” offering that gives access to Exchange and SharePoint for the price of a latte ($3 per user per month).

I’m off back to the conference to see what people think but would love to hear what you think about this if you’re a Microsoft partner.