Earn 6 times more with Microsoft cloud-based Office 365

In a bid to capture Small and Mid Sized Businesses (SMB) in India, Microsoft has offered schemes to attract partners in class B and C cities to sell its cloud-based Office 365.

Microsoft claims that its typical cloud partner earns 6 times margin over the perpetual licensing model of Microsoft Office.

The company has also advertised in major channel publications citing white papers on cloud opportunities.

The goal of the paper is to provide partners new insight on how to grow their businesses using Office 365 and it highlights specific best practices, recommendations, supporting examples, and resulting economics that will allow other partners to replicate their success, mentions the note on the white paper.

On benefits of software as a subscription (read office 365) over the perpetual license model, Microsoft says that the cloud based service cuts down total IT cost, the subscription is independent of devices which includes free upgrades and guarantees 99.9% financial service level agreement.

Lucknow-based Pramod Mishra, owner, Agraya Infosolutions who sells perpetual license model of Microsoft office was not convinced irrespective of the fancy margins Microsoft seems to offer.

He says, "Service in city like Lucknow needs to be checked and I am not sure how Microsoft will fulfill the SLAs."