Microsoft Office 2013 Released to Manufacturing

A month ago Microsoft disclosed the details and pricing on the upcoming version of its most popular productivity suite – Office 2013. Microsoft has now announced that Office 2013 has been released to manufacturing.

The company will first make the software available to TechNet and MSDN subscribers and Office 365 Enterprise customers. Later on, Volume Licensing customers with Software Assurance will be allowed to download the Office 2013 applications as well as other Office products including SharePoint 2013, Lync 2013 and Exchange 2013 through the Volume Licensing Service Center by mid-November.

The general retail availability will be scheduled later, somewhere in the first quarter of 2013.

This milestone means the coding and testing phase of the project is complete and we are now focused on releasing the new Office via multiple distribution channels to our consumer and business customers. This is the most ambitious release of Office we’ve ever done. It spans the full family of Office applications, servers and cloud services, says Microsoft.

As you may be aware, the new version of Office boasts a full family of office applications and cloud storage, something that wasn’t seen in the earlier versions. Besides, it has a touch friendly design that has been optimized to work on Windows’ latest OS – Windows 8. There are also plenty of more features in store for business customers to facilitate the software adoption within their organizations.

The current release of the Office is being viewed as the most ambitious release of Office ever done. The development and the testing of the Office’s next iteration has been completed.

Starting October 19, customers buying Office 2010 from local retailers or resellers will receive the new Office for free upon availability i.e. the buyer will be eligible for a free upgrade once the software is available publicly. Customers will also see a preview version of the new Office on Windows RT devices, beginning with the Windows 8 launch on October 26.