Tom Raftery’s Social Media

InformationWeek are reporting that Google have released a business class version of their Google Apps.

The new suite of apps will be called Google Apps Premier Edition and, according to the article:

Google Apps Premier Edition features application programming interfaces that businesses can use to integrate it with their own applications. Ten Gigabytes (10GB) of storage for ad-free Gmail is offered standard, meaning workers can spend more time working and less time cleaning out their in-boxes. And Google is offering service level agreements that promise 99.9% uptime and 24×7 tech support.

But possibly the most compelling aspect of Google Apps — at least from the standpoint of potential customers considering a switch from Microsoft products — is the price. Google is offering the whole package for just $50 per user, per year.

The SLA and the 24×7 phone support make this a compelling offering, particularly when you consider there is no software to roll out and/or maintain.

The biggest shortcomings in Google’s apps, right now is the lack of a presentation tool and contacts management but look to Google to address these soon. And obviously, because it is Software as a Service, the new functionality will just appear one day! No messy upgrading or downloading.

This really puts it up to Microsoft.

Here is the feature comparison across the free and premium versions of Google Apps:

More here.

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