Analyst Reports

Office 2013: A Breakthrough In Productivity

Jan. 29, 2013

Forrester Research, Inc.

Forrester Research provides an overview of the new Office. In this independent report, Forrester analysts focus on how Microsoft addresses the important areas of mobile, social, and cloud to maintain its dominant position in enterprise knowledge worker technology.

Microsoft Lync 2013: Don’t Base Upgrades on New Features Alone

Oct. 5, 2012

Gartner Research

Gartner reviews the new Lync, both on prem and Online, and discusses the enhancements including HD multiparty video, mobile and Web clients, persistent group chat, and greater integration with Skype, Windows 8 and Office 2013.

Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications (Gartner Inc.)

Aug. 27, 2012

Gartner evaluated Microsoft’s Lync 2010 and Exchange 2010 in this report and placed Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant.

The Forrester Wave™: Cloud Strategies Of Online Collaboration Software Vendors, Q3 2012

Aug. 16, 2012

Forrester Research, Inc.

Forrester Research, Inc. positioned Microsoft as a leader in The Forrester Wave™: Cloud Strategies Of Online Collaboration Software Vendors, Q3 2012. Forrester Research evaluated eight significant collaboration services providers for this report. This report details their findings on how well each vendor fulfills their criteria for constructing an online collaboration service, and where they stand in relation to each other, to help CIOs and their staff evaluate key criteria when looking for at a prospective provider for their needs. Given the relative immaturity of this market and the nature of client questions about it, Forrester chose to evaluate the overall strategies of these providers across criteria like global footprint, service-level agreements, mobile support, enterprise readiness, and more.

MarketScope for Enterprise Instant Messaging and Presence (Gartner Research)

Aug. 16, 2012

Microsoft is rated as Strong Positive in this MarketScope report. Gartner believes “instant messaging and presence capabilities are an integral part of enterprises' unified communications and collaboration portfolios.”

Magic Quadrant for Secure Email Gateways (Gartner Inc.)

Aug. 15, 2012

Gartner has positioned Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant of the 2012 Magic Quadrant for Secure Email Gateways, based on an evaluation of Forefront Online Protection for Exchange and Forefront Protection 2010 for Exchange Server.

MarketScope for Email Systems (Gartner Inc.)

Aug. 9, 2012

Gartner has rated Microsoft Exchange (on-premises) as a “Strong Positive” and Microsoft Exchange Online as a “Positive” in the 2012 MarketScope for Email Systems.

MarketScope for Project and Portfolio Management Software Applications (Gartner Research)

June 27, 2012

Gartner rates Microsoft ‘Positive’ in the 2012 MarketScope for Project and Portfolio Management Software Applications.

All Email Is Not Created Equal: Understanding Email Economics When Considering the Cloud

June 12, 2012

Gartner, Inc.

Gartner analyst Matt Cain analyzes the details behind the cost of cloud e-mail services. The availability of seemingly low-cost cloud email services has put a laser-like focus on email spending. Organizations must delve deeply into the numbers to get a true picture of all the cost dynamics at work.

Life on the High Wire: How to Move 12,500 Global Users From Notes to Office 365 With Minimal User Disruption

May 17, 2012

Gartner, Inc.

Gartner analyst Matt Cain examines how Flowserve successfully moved 12,500 Notes/Domino users across 346 sites worldwide, in 20 time zones, to Microsoft Office 365.

Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Wireless Email Market (Gartner Research)

Dec. 27, 2011

Gartner has positioned Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant in the 2011 Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Wireless Email Market.

Magic Quadrant for Business Process Analysis Tools (Gartner Research)

Dec. 12, 2011

Gartner positions Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant. The report says “Business process analysis tools continue to grow in importance as business managers, process architects and process analysts seek to better understand, streamline and automate their business processes, and to communicate their needs to IT professionals.”

Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service (Gartner Research)

Dec. 7, 2011

Gartner places Microsoft in the Challengers Quadrant on the 2011 Magic Quadrant for Unified Communications as a Service, based on an evaluation of completeness of vision and ability to execute.

Magic Quadrant for Web Conferencing (Gartner Research)

Dec. 5, 2011

Gartner positions Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant. Gartner believes the relevance of web conferencing continues to grow, noting “the primary justification for Web conferencing has been cost savings and other benefits arising from reductions in business travel. When meeting participants cannot travel because of security, environmental or other reasons, Web conferencing becomes a mission-critical capability.”

Market Scope for Enterprise Search (Gartner Research)

Nov. 18, 2011

Gartner rates Microsoft ‘Strong Positive’ in the 2011 Market Scope for Enterprise Search.

The Forrester Wave™: Enterprise Content Management, Q4 2011 (Forrester Research, Inc.)

Nov. 1, 2011

Forrester Research Inc., a leading independent research firm, recognized Microsoft SharePoint as a Leader in two technology areas in The Forrester Wave™: Enterprise Content Management, Q4 2011. According to Forrester, "SharePoint 2010 continues to grow in popularity, thanks to its blend of collaboration and content management support. SharePoint 2010’s ECM capabilities are much improved from the 2007 release, and Microsoft has focused on empowering the worker by delivering a better enterprise-ready solution."

Magic Quadrant for Horizontal Portals

Oct. 24, 2011

Gartner positions Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant on the 2011 Magic Quadrant for Horizontal Portals based on an evaluation of completeness of vision and ability to execute.

Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Content Management (Gartner Research)

Oct. 13, 2011

Microsoft is placed in the Leaders Quadrant of this report, which looks at the enterprise content management market and how Gartner rates vendors and their packaged ECM products. According to Gartner “Changing delivery models, new value propositions, solution configurations and partner ecosystems make ECM relevant to every business.”

SharePoint 2010: Taking Your Deployment to the Next Level (Gartner Research)

Oct. 1, 2011

Microsoft’s Jared Spataro and Gartner Research’s Mark Gilbert discuss how businesses can get the most out of their SharePoint investment.

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Corporate Telephony, 2011 (Gartner Research)

Sept. 15, 2011

Microsoft placed in the Visionaries Quadrant. Gartner notes “Companies are increasingly focusing their strategies and acquisition decisions around unified communications and collaboration (UCC) technology; it is supplanting the historic domain of corporate telephony.”

Magic Quadrant for Social Software in the Workplace (Gartner Research)

Aug. 25, 2011

Gartner positions Microsoft in the Leaders Quadrant in the 2011 Magic Quadrant for Social Software in the Workplace.

Market Scope for Enterprise Instant Messaging and Presence (Gartner Research)

July 5, 2011

Microsoft is rated as Strong Positive in this Market Scope report. Gartner believes IM and presence platforms have become elements of core infrastructure for enterprises and the integration of presence information with email and other business applications is a central requirement that impacts workflow and collaborative decision making.

The Total Economic Impact of Microsoft Office 365 (Forrester Consulting)

June 1, 2011

Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to examine the Total Economic Impact™ and potential return on investment SMB companies may realize by deploying Office 365, consisting of cloud deployments of Exchange Online (with Forefront Online Protection for Exchange), Lync Online, SharePoint Online, and Office Professional Plus. The study found that Office 365 delivered a 321% return on investment with a two month payback period for the composite midsize organization. Office 365 has a lower Total Cost of Ownership, and improves productivity compared to a similar on premises implementation.

E-Mail Maturity Model: Optimizing the Investment (Gartner Research)

April 27, 2011

In this report, Gartner says “Most organizations will benefit from a careful analysis of the maturity of their e-mail system to uncover weaknesses. This exercise can lead to a substantial improvement in all aspects of the e-mail infrastructure. Ultimately, we believe e-mail — despite its reputation as a commodity — can offer substantial competitive advantage.”

Critical Capabilities for Unified Communications as a Service (Gartner Research)

March 30, 2011

This research evaluates leading Uncaps portfolios in the North American market. It focuses on enterprise use cases and also considers hybrid, SMB and very large enterprise environments. Microsoft’s BPOS offering was given an overall score of 3.0 in use cases, with a Product Viability score of Excellent.

The Total Economic Impact Of Microsoft Lync Server 2010 (Forrester Consulting)

Nov. 1, 2010

Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to examine the Total Economic Impact™ and potential return on investment on Lync Server 2010. The study found that for a composite organization, Lync 2010 offers a risk-adjusted ROI of 337 percent, including $6.35 million in hard cost savings over three years, with a payback period of 12 months.

The Total Economic Impact Of Implementing Microsoft’s Productivity Platform (Forrester Consulting)

May 1, 2010

Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to examine the Total Economic Impact™ and potential return on investment on the integrated value that enterprises may realize by deploying Microsoft Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Exchange 2010 and Office Communications Server 2007 R2 together. The study found that in a composite organization, Microsoft’s solutions offered improvements in workforce productivity, resulting in savings, on average, of 82.33 hours per year or 3.96% of time per employee per day for the composite organization.

Disclaimer:
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner's research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

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