June 10, 2009

Google has worked out a way of syncing its online applications with Microsoft's Outlook email client.

The move continues Google's push into the Vole's turf by effectively turning its own software against it.

Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook means that web-based applications offerred by Google will work with its rival's email, contacts, and calendars.

Google engineer Eric Orth wrote in his bog that the move will remove a key barrier to enterprise adoption of Google Apps.

The search outfit has already enabled people to use its Gmail service offline and made its 'cloud' based software interoperable with Blackberry smartphones.

Google Apps Sync for Outlook is being flogged for $50 per year per business user, although Google is providing the software to education or nonprofit groups at no charge.

In some ways the syncing software might be viewed as an admission by Google that it has so far failed to convince business customers to switch away from Microsoft's products.

Orth wrote that many business users prefer Gmail's interface and features to products they've used in the past. But there are people who just love Outlook and this is why Google is offering software to sync with it. µ