Microsoft to rent Office

NEWS Microsoft has said it will facilitate hosting office productivity software over the Internet - just days after Sun Microsystems announced plans to do the same. In a press conference, Microsoft president, Steve Ballmer, declined to say when the company will fully embrace the hosting arena but stated that Microsoft wanted to both offer hosting and make Microsoft Office available on PCs. The software giant, which has been gearing up to offer application server technology for a number of months, has begun a pilot programme for its BackOffice software. The company has offered the scheme to a limited number of ISPs to begin selling the software on a subscription basis. One of the first members of the programme, FutureLink Distribution, will be offering Microsoft SQL Server, Exchange and Windows NT Server on its FutureLink Server Farm for as little as one month to as long as two years.