There has always been rivalry in the tech industry, but it’s not that common when a tech giant chooses to name and launch a direct assault on an opponent.
Take a look at the following YouTube video, which was just put up yesterday by Microsoft on YouTube, on why their solutions are better than Google’s cloud ones. Basically it charges that Google only has cloud-based solutions, whilst Microsoft has a mix of on-prem and cloud solutions that fit its customers better.
My comment is that the world is migrating towards cloud-based solutions (with some caveats as kinks are being worked out), so vendors either evolve or be rendered obsolete. And with Google in the driver’s seat on this, it can’t be fun for others having to play catch up.
As an aside, from the browser (Chrome vs IE), to Office productivity tools (Google docs vs MS Office), to email (cloud-based Gmail vs Exchange), to mobile OSes (open-sourced Android vs Windows Mobile), just to name a few, Microsoft must really be smarting at the in-roads that Google is making.
Even in the microsm that is the Singapore environment, the tonality between Google (we give stuff for free for advertising) and Microsoft (we build great software products and deserve to be paid for them) couldn’t be more different.
Contrast two recent events: Google’s free streetviews and tie-up with LTA to Microsoft’s Business Software Alliance (BSA) complaining and warning about piracy at Sim Lim Square, a popular local electronic hangout place.
i fell asleep trying to follow the video. That’s the problem with Microsoft – they dont know how to explain things simply. And their marketing sucks.
In Singapore for example, they never tell us enough stuff about the latest happenings at Microsoft. It’s not that Google does a better job, but Google’s products are easy to figure out and reaches directly to consumers thru Google.com and Gmail.
Microsoft launched an amazing free anti-virus software called Security Essentials end last year and their chaps here did nothing to tell the media, probably because it is a free software and Microsoft Singapore wont be making any revenue from it. I found out about it when a friend told me about it.
When I wanted to test Windows 7 RTM last year like weeks before the launch, they had nothing for us to lay our hands on while the whole world was already writing about it. Google is not better, I got my Wave account from my friend’s invite after I gave up trying to get one from Google Singapore, who did try their best to get one from me but as I understand there were some red tape and all.
The thing is, Google is an ant compared to Microsoft when it comes to reaching out to traditional media like myself. Google’s strength in PR is in viral marketing, I hear some stuff from my frens and I go check it out. They have a skeleton team in Singapore handling traditional PR for the whole SEA region.
Microsoft is different, they have PRs for individual divisions and are oiled to deal with one-to-few interactions instead of the one-to-many style of Google. Yet in Singapore, I feel that Microsoft really can do better. In my opinion, the PR leading to Windows 7 launch last year here was not up to par, and with Office 2010 looming, I seriously think they need to do a better job.
Back to the video. I love Microsoft, dont get me wrong. For years I have grown up with Windows and now Xbox is my favorite game platform, but Microsoft seriously needs to reinvent itself. It keeps talking about business this and business that, is it giving up on the consumer space without a fight? It says that people using Google will lose the familiarity of the old interface they grew up with. But that is the issue isnt it? This is the new world, and Google is setting the next generation of familiarity, unless MS does something about it and stop sounding like a broken clock.
Sounds like Microsoft is feeling insecure.