Microsoft to deliver SharePoint apps for Windows 8, Windows Phone, iOS starting in early 2013
Summary: Microsoft is readying two new companion apps for SharePoint that will work on Windows 8, Windows Phone and iOS devices starting early next year. — Microsoft is working …
Context & Ripple Effects
The SharePoint app announcement is the latest installment of a commitment Microsoft executives made back in December 2011, when they promised more multi-platform mobile products through 2012. The company has already moved its unified-communications stack this way, shipping a Lync app for Windows 8 and Windows RT in late October, and SharePoint companion apps for Windows 8, Windows Phone and iOS extend the same playbook to its collaboration server.
Timing matters: the news lands days after the Windows Phone 8 launch and alongside the same-day wave of coverage that included Yammer price cuts, suggesting Microsoft is packaging SharePoint, Lync and Yammer as one cross-platform enterprise mobility story rather than isolated product updates. The pickup across TechCrunch, AllThingsD and the Windows enthusiast blogs shows how far the message travelled.
First-order effects
- SharePoint customers with iPad and iPhone fleets get native companion apps in early 2013 instead of relying on the mobile browser, removing a long-standing friction point for enterprises standardizing on Apple hardware.
- Windows Phone 8 gains an enterprise argument at launch: a first-party SharePoint client gives Microsoft's own phone platform a collaboration hook that rivals must match through third-party apps.
Second-order effects
- Independent mobile SharePoint client vendors face a free, first-party alternative on iOS, pressuring their paid-app pricing just as Microsoft's own Lync move did in communications.
- Apple's ecosystem benefits: official Microsoft server clients reinforce the iPad and iPhone's place in corporate deployments, giving IT departments less reason to hold out for Windows tablets.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, Microsoft's server franchises are being decoupled from Windows devices — revenue follows the service subscription rather than the client OS, weakening the historical lock-in between Windows market share and Office-server adoption.
- Enterprise mobility planning shifts accordingly: CIOs can treat SharePoint, Lync and Yammer as platform-neutral services, which over time reduces one of the strongest remaining arguments for standardized Windows fleets.
The trend: Microsoft is systematically carrying its enterprise server products — Lync, now SharePoint — onto rival mobile platforms, trading Windows-client lock-in for reach in a post-PC enterprise.