Microsoft partners with Dell, Pegatron, and eight regional OEMs to preinstall Office and Skype on Android devices; expands partnership with Samsung to tablets
thoughts on the Office business Ben Geier / Fortune : How Microsoft is taking on Google on its home turf Samsung Tomorrow : Samsung Electronics and Microsoft Expand Partnership to Bring Microsoft Services to More Customers on More Devices Chloe Albanesius / PCMag Australia Feed : Samsung, Dell to Pre-Load Microsoft Office Apps on Android Chris Smith / BGR : It looks like ditching the Galaxy S6's bloatware won't be so easy Julie Bort / Business Insider : Microsoft teams up with Samsung to squeeze out Google Fred Donovan / FierceMobileIT News : Microsoft inks deals to preinstall Office, other software on 11 manufacturers' devices Shira Ovide / Wall Street Journal : Microsoft Apps to be Pre-Installed on Some Android Devices Nicole Arce / Tech Times : Microsoft Seals Deal With Samsung, Dell, Other OEMs To Preinstall Apps In Android Tablets Daniel Bader / MobileSyrup.com : Sorry, Samsung won't let you remove most apps from the Galaxy S6 Mark Hachman / CITEworld : Microsoft pursues Android users, preloading Office on Samsung, Dell tablets James Farrell / SiliconANGLE : Samsung and 11 more manufactures team-up with Microsoft to preinstall apps on Android devices Nick Wingfield / New York Times : Microsoft Partners With Android Makers in Its Latest Mobile Push Lindsey Caldwell / SlashGear : Microsoft productivity services will be on new Samsung and Dell Android devices Mark Hachman / InfoWorld : Microsoft pursues Android users, preloading Office on Samsung, Dell tablets Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch : Microsoft Signs 11 Agreements With OEMs To Bring Office To More Android Handsets And Tablets Nick Statt / CNET : Microsoft to preinstall more apps on Android with Dell partnership Stephen Schenck / Pocketnow : Microsoft inks deals with Android OEMs to pre-install apps and services Kyle Wiggers / Digital Trends : Microsoft teams up with Samsung and Dell to get Office, OneDrive, and Skype on tablets Neil McAllister / The Register : Forget WinPhone - if you want Microsoft apps, grab an Android Tweets: Brad Smith / @bradsmi : Microsoft advances cross-platform productivity in partnership with Samsung & 10 other hardware makers. http://blogs.microsoft.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
This deal is the second wave of a distribution push that began weeks earlier: Microsoft shipped Office for Android tablets and Outlook for iOS/Android in January (the tablet Office launch), then Samsung started bundling Microsoft apps on the Galaxy S6. What changes today is breadth — beyond Samsung phones, Dell, Pegatron, and eight regional OEMs now preinstall Office and Skype at the factory, and the Samsung pact extends to tablets.
The strategic logic is visible in what surrounds it: Microsoft is simultaneously testing universal Office apps on its own Windows Phones, while coverage of the S6 already flagged that removing the bundled apps won't be easy. A year later the roster had grown to 74 Android OEMs pre-installing Microsoft apps, so this announcement marks the point where the program stopped being a Samsung arrangement and became an industry default.
First-order effects
- Dell, Pegatron, and the eight regional OEMs now ship every new Android device with Office and Skype resident out of the box, and Samsung's Microsoft footprint stretches from phones onto its tablet line.
Second-order effects
- Google loses exclusive control of the Android out-of-box experience on partner hardware — Business Insider framed the Samsung deal as squeezing Google on its own turf, and BGR flagged that users ditching S6 bloatware just got harder.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds — as the jump to 74 OEMs by early 2016 suggests it did — Microsoft's productivity franchise decouples entirely from Windows, and the durable tie to Samsung deepens into the tighter Outlook, OneDrive, and Your Phone integration of the Note10 era and the foldables-specific Office and Teams work that followed.
The trend: Microsoft is converting its productivity suite from a Windows-only asset into cross-platform distribution rented on rival hardware, with OEM preinstall deals as the delivery mechanism.