Microsoft has announced that it will be releasing versions of Office for the Android and IOS mobile platforms early next year. Office is already available to the Windows Phone OS. Releasing Office to Android and IOS came as a surprise to many people because, most people have found a solution to read, store, modify and create Office documents by using other applications such as QuickOffice.
The positives of this release will be the integration with SkyDrive and other Microsoft products. While this can also cause complexity for IT by further fragmenting the locations of the most up-to-date documents and files. It will also standardize how users will access their documents created in MS Office.
Microsoft took so long to develop Office for the popular mobile platforms, which left the door wide open for developers to create amazing apps that can be used to create, modify and store documents in a secure fashion. This procrastination could cost Microsoft to lose pull in the mobile environment. They need to redesign Office to use the functionalities that are expected in mobile platforms, and not just port Office to work in the mobile platforms.