I always like to keep an eye on the Microsoft financial results in relation to the Lync/UC/Collaboration proposition. Generally the results were good, with Cloud (which includes Office 365 and Azure) and Windows Licencing seeing big growth.
Lync was mentioned on the earnings call as having double digit growth (alongside Exchange, SharePoint, SQL Server, System Center and Windows Server Premium).
Office 365 Home now has 4.4 million subscribers, adding nearly a million users this quarter, all with 60 “Skype world” minutes. Skype ad revenue was also noted as growing
Office 365 revenue grew 100%, with the majority of Office 365 users having access to Lync on Office 365, and some having “E4” which gives them the equivalent of users CALs to run Lync with Enterprise Voice on-prem.
The commitment to multiple device/platform support was also called out on the call multiple times
“We are committed to ensuring that our cloud services are available across all device platforms that people use. We’re delivering a cloud for everyone on every device.”.
This is good to hear, and see, with things like Office being released for the iPad.
The other big news was the acquisition of Nokia. Which actually closed after the earnings call. What impact this may have in further Skype/Lync integration to Windows phone, we shall see.
Also worth noting that Skype has now made Group / Multiparty Video calling and screen sharing free on the service. Previously a Skype premium only feature.
Earnings source information and details found here.
