Microsoft to deliver new Windows 8 and Windows RT Lync app in late October
Summary: The product formerly known as Lync MX, a touch-centric, Windows Store app, will be available for Windows 8 and Windows RT PCs and tablets in late October. — Testers have been putting the new version …
Context & Ripple Effects
The timing is no accident: Microsoft has already confirmed an October 25 launch date for Windows 8, and this touch-centric Lync client — formerly known as Lync MX — is being positioned as a day-one Windows Store app for both Windows 8 PCs and Windows RT tablets. Testers have been evaluating the build ahead of that late-October window.
It also extends a pattern Microsoft started last December, when it brought OneNote to the iPad and promised a Lync app would follow: putting its communications and productivity brands onto new form factors early, rather than waiting for third parties. For a Windows Store that needs credible first-party apps at launch, an enterprise-grade Lync client matters more than its user count suggests.
First-order effects
- Enterprise Lync customers buying Windows 8 machines or Windows RT tablets get a native, touch-first client at launch instead of relying on the desktop Lync UI adapted to a touchscreen.
- Microsoft gains a marquee business app in the Windows Store right as the store opens alongside the October 25 Windows 8 release.
Second-order effects
- Rivals in unified communications — Cisco most directly — face pressure to ship their own Windows Store-style touch clients, since Microsoft now controls both the platform and the flagship communications app on it.
- For hardware makers betting on Windows RT tablets for corporate fleets, a first-party Lync client removes one of the objections IT departments would otherwise raise about the ARM-based devices.
Third-order effects
- If Microsoft keeps leading each new surface with first-party touch versions of its server-tied products, the Windows Store's early catalog will skew toward apps that reinforce Microsoft's own backend stack — Lync Server, Exchange, SharePoint — tightening the link between device adoption and Microsoft infrastructure sales.
- Unified communications clients drifting toward touch-first, store-distributed designs points to a longer-term convergence where the tablet form factor becomes a standard endpoint for enterprise voice and conferencing, not just consumption.
The trend: Microsoft is seeding Windows 8's app ecosystem with first-party touch clients for its enterprise products, timed to the operating system's launch cadence.