Have you heard of the Microsoft Business Incentive Fund? Not many people have. But it is from this financial war chest that an astonishing quarter of a million dollar discount was given to one US university alone in order to ensure it switched to Microsoft's Office 365 cloud product rather than Google Apps or Lotus Notes.
Recently we reported on how Microsoft and Amazon were engaging in a price war for developer's custom on their cloud platforms. Now Microsoft has taken a similar approach to give it the edge against the Google Apps suite.
There is good news for Microsoft though - the university was focussed on procuring a solid cloud offering, and Office 365 easily trumped Lotus Notes' cloud version on that front. What with the recent set of updates across Office 365 - the removal of the 'Beta' label, and SkyDrive enhancements, Microsoft will be pushing it's offering even harder against Google. But how many more pricing 'incentives' will it need?
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