Apple reportedly has plans to open a new office in Israel, its first center outside of its Cupertino, California headquarters. The outpost will be headed by Aharon Aharon, Israeli business news site Globes said Wednesday, noting that Aharon is a well established figure in Israeli technology circles. Aharon currently serves as the chairman of radio frequency imaging firm Camero Tech Ltd. He has also served on the board of Discretix and once worked as a vice president for Zoran Corporation. Israeli’s new Apple head will train in Cupertino for several months before opening the Israel-based facility, the report says. This isn’t the first move Apple has made in Israel recently: the company is reportedly in acquisition talks with Anobit, a fabless flash storage vendor that has provided parts to Apple for its iPad, iPhone and iPod touch product families. Rumors have suggested Apple could spend as much as $400 to $500 million for Anobit.

Read

Microsoft may be working to develop a special version of its Office suite for Apple’s iPad. The company is also reportedly prepping an Office Suite update that will add official support for Lion and may be available from the Mac App Store, The Daily reported Tuesday. The new Office apps for Lion could cost as little as $10 each, or the same price Apple charges for its Keynote, Numbers and Pages titles, and they will also support sync with Office 365 and other mobile versions of the application. No additional details were reported regarding pricing or a release schedule for Microsoft’s Office for iPad. “We already deliver Office on multiple platforms and devices and are committed to expanding in the future, but have nothing further to share today,” Microsoft said in a statement to CNET, neglecting to confirm or deny the report.

Read [The Daily] Read [CNET]

Moments ago, Microsoft officially released its new cloud-based Office product, Office 365, which will compete directly with Google Docs. The Office 365 suite, which has been in public beta for awhile now, is being targeted at the enterprise market and plans for the entire suite cost between $10 and $27 each month depending on the feature set chosen. Small and medium-sized businesses can also choose a more cost effective $6 option that only includes Office Web Apps and Microsoft Exchange. Those options, however, are all more expensive than the $50 annual fee that Google charges corporate users for access to its Google Docs suite. Microsoft’s full press release follows below.

Microsoft Launches Office 365 Globally

World-class collaboration tools are now available for businesses large and small.

NEW YORK — June 28, 2011 — Today, at media events around the world, Microsoft Corp. announced the availability ofMicrosoft Office 365, the company’s newest cloud service. Office 365 is now available in 40 markets, and it brings together Microsoft Office, Microsoft SharePoint Online, Microsoft Exchange Online and Microsoft Lync Online in an always-up-to-date cloud service, at a predictable monthly subscription.

The service was introduced in beta last year with enthusiastic response and, in a few months, more than 200,000 organizations signed up and began testing it. Businesses using Office 365 are already reporting impressive results and reducing IT costs by up to an estimated 50 percent while boosting productivity.

Today, more than 20 service providers around the globe also shared plans to bring Office 365 to their customers this year. Bell Canada, Intuit Inc., NTT Communications Corp., Telefonica S.A., Telstra Corp. and Vodafone Group Plc, among others, will package and sell Office 365 with their own services for small and midsize businesses.

“Great collaboration is critical to business growth, and because it’s so important, we believe the best collaboration technology should be available to everyone,” said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. “With a few clicks, Office 365 levels the playing field, giving small and midsize businesses powerful collaboration tools that have given big businesses an edge for years.”

A Game Changer for Businesses of All Sizes

Office 365 is available in a wide range of service plans designed to meet the needs of businesses of all sizes, ranging from the largest to the smallest.

With Office 365, people can stay on the “same page” using instant messaging and virtual meetings with people who are just down the hall or across the world. They can work on files and documents at the same time and share ideas as easily as they can share calendars. Office 365 gives people new ways to work together with ease, on virtually any device.

Microsoft Office applications are at the heart of Office 365. Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, Excel, OneNote, Outlook and other Office applications connect to Microsoft Exchange, SharePoint and Lync to deliver a world-class solution for communication and collaboration.

“When I saw Office 365, I knew this was the way businesses would work in the future,” said Elia Wallen, owner of fast-growing temporary housing provider Travelers Haven. “With Office 365, I’m going to save $100,000 a year and cut 30 hours of work a day across my 35 employees, but most importantly, my team is going to be able to work together better — no matter where they are.”

More stories from businesses that have tried Office 365 are available athttp://www.microsoft.com/casestudies.

Office 365 Partners

Microsoft is building a massive partner ecosystem around Office 365, including systems integrators, software vendors, resellers and other partners. Today, that ecosystem is expanding as the company partners in new ways with market-leading service providers. These companies will package Office 365 with their own services — from Web hosting and broadband to finance solutions and mobile services — and bring those new offerings to millions of small and midsize businesses globally.

“Our partners represent some of the best-known, most-trusted brands in their local markets,” said Kurt DelBene, president, Microsoft Office Division. “Our customers will be able to rest easy knowing their cloud services are backed by Microsoft and some of the greatest service providers in the world.”

A list of Office 365 service provider partners is available here.

About Office 365

Office 365 offers a range of service plans for a predictable monthly price from $2 to $27 per user per month. With Office 365 for small businesses, customers can be up and running with Office Web Apps, Microsoft Exchange Online, Microsoft SharePoint Online, Microsoft Lync Online and an external website in minutes, for $6 (U.S.) per user, per month. These tools put enterprise-grade email, shared documents, instant messaging, video and Web conferencing, portals, and more at everyone’s fingertips.

Office 365 for enterprises has an array of choices, from simple email to comprehensive suites to meet the needs of midsize and large businesses, as well as government organizations. Customers can now get Microsoft Office Professional Plus on a pay-as-you-go basis with cloud-based versions of the industry’s leading business communications and collaboration services. Each of these plans comes with the advanced IT controls, innovative security technologies, 24/7 IT support and reliability customers expect from Microsoft.

Availability

Office 365 for small businesses and Office 365 for enterprises are available now. Businesses can try Office 365 for free for 30 days by signing up at http://www.office365.com or from their local Microsoft partner. Follow Office 365 on Twitter (@Office365), Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/office365) and the Office 365 blog at http://community.office365.comfor the latest information.

A new page has been revealed on the Best Buy Mexico website that may shed light on the release date for Apple’s upcoming iWork refresh. According to the page, which has been pulled from Best Buy Mexico’s website, the company will be holding a launch event on February 19th to celebrate the arrival of iWork ’11. Apple has not yet announced a launch date for the new version of its iWork productivity suite, though this leak on the Best Buy Mexico site does line up well with earlier rumors. iWork competes with Microsoft’s Office suite and consists of Pages, Apple’s word processing application; Numbers, a spreadsheet app; and Keynote, a presentation tool akin to PowerPoint.

[Via Apple Bitch]

Read

Sales of illegitimate copies of Microsoft programs may be doing more than just lining hackers’ pockets. According to Microsoft’s lawyers, notorious Mexican drug cartel La Familia Michoacana is selling counterfeit Microsoft software to help fund kidnappings, drug trafficking, weapons trafficking and other criminal activities. David Finn, Microsoft’s Associate General Counsel dealing with Worldwide Anti-piracy and Anti-counterfeiting, wrote about the problem in a blog post on Thursday. “An important theme that resonated among the international groups is the number of organized criminal gangs that rely on the profits gleaned from pirated software to fund other crimes,” Finn wrote on a Microsoft blog. “Sophisticated criminal syndicates and drug cartels are building large scale counterfeiting operations and selling illegal software to consumers. These illegal enterprises have generated astronomical profits that the gangs funnel toward violent crimes such as drug trafficking, arms and weapons trafficking, kidnapping and extortion.” Finn went on to cite a study conducted by Mexico’s Attorney General stating that the Familia cartel earns more than $2.2 million each day — over $800 million annually — from sales of counterfeit goods.

[Via Seattle Post-Intelligencer]

Read

Microsoft on Tuesday launched a new version of its OneNote mobile application for Apple’s iOS platform. Compatibile with the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, OneNote allows iPhone users to create, edit and sync notes using Microsoft’s popular cloud-based note-taking solution. OneNote is part of Microsoft’s famed Office suite of products, and is the first Office application to be built by Microsoft for the iOS platform. Microsoft, which has launched several other apps for iOS in the past, has not specifically stated whether or not it intends to launch additional apps for iOS. Instead, a company executive said only that Microsoft would continue to expand Office across several platforms. Hit the break for a link to the Microsoft’s OneNote app in iTunes, which is available for free, though only for a limited time.

Read [iTunes link]

Earlier today, Microsoft finally announced the Office for Mac 2011 ship date, and it’s October 26th. We exclusively showed you Office for Mac 2011 way back in March, and started playing around with the software suite in April. We have been waiting for a PC-like version of Office for the Mac OS, well, forever, and we’re glad to see it finally get close to a general release. The thing we’re most excited about? Outlook 2011 and the great Exchange integration. Sorry, Mail.app, it was nice knowing you. In typical Microsoftness, there will be different flavors of Office: Home and Student Edition, Home and Business, as well as PowerPoint, Word, and Excel available independently for purchase.

Read

Reuters is reporting that search giant Google had an office in Seoul, South Korea raided by police earlier today. The Korean National Police Agency said they “have been investigating Google Korea LLC on suspicion of unauthorized collection and storage of data on unspecified Internet users from Wi-Fi networks.” Google has been collecting data in South Korea since late last year in preparation for the launch of the Street View service. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission, as well as other European governments, are also looking into allegations that Google illegally collected and stored information from Wi-Fi networks while conducting its Street View surveys. Google has yet to comment on the South Korean raid.

Read

Microsoft Office 2011 for Mac has been given an official release date month and pricing structure. Sometime in October, Office 2011 por la Mac will be released in two flavors, Home and Student Edition and Home and Office Edition. The Home and Student offering will come with Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Messenger, while Home and Business Edition will include all of the aforementioned programs as well as Microsoft’s redesigned email client Outlook. A single-user install of Home and Student will retail for $119 and a family pack of three-installs can be purchased for $149. A single-install of Home and Business will retail for $199 and a multi-pack that allows installation on two machines can be purchased for $279. From now until November 30th, if you buy Office 2008 you will be eligible to upgrade to Office 2011 for free. Anyone excited?

Read

Microsoft has posted a one and a half minute video teaser of Microsoft Office 2011 up on YouTube. The video lets you know that Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and Outlook all come with the Ribbon interface, and that Office and Messenger have been completely redesigned. If you are interested in a very high level overview of the new software hit the jump, the video is waiting for you.

Read

Oh man, this is definitely not something we wanted to hear: Microsoft has announced on its blog that Office for Mac 2011 will only ship as a 32-bit version. Citing a need for enhanced compatibility between the Office for Windows and Office for Mac over high-power performance, Microsoft said that it would not have been possible for its team to create a 64-bit version of Office 2011″because Apple’s frameworks require us to complete the move to Cocoa before we can build a 64-bit version.” Office 2011 is not 100% Cocoa. Microsoft is downplaying the lack of 64-bit support by stating that “most users with typical or even larger-than-average document content will not notice a difference in performance” and that the only area “64-bit can make a difference is for people working with huge amounts of data.” You know, like the professionals who are champing at the bit for Office 2011 and its inclusion of Outlook.

[Via ZDNet]

Read

Since we have a brand new office in the heart of New York City, school is basically done, and we are growing faster than ever, we are looking for die-hard BGR interns for the summer. If you think you are up for working with us, hit us up. Please live in NYC or be able to quickly commute. Also, we would be looking for someone who could put in a decent amount of time — at least around 20-30 hours per week.

If you would like to apply, hit the break for the finer details!

Please email the following information to us:

• Four sample posts that you’d expect to appear on BGR. The posts can be on whatever tech topics you’d like, general tech, mobile, gadgets, business — whatever. Just make sure to please send us original posts and not previously written stuff.
• Tell us your favorite device ever.
• A short bio and contact information.
• Amount of time you can realistically devote to interning at BGR.
• Why you love BGR and what you think you can contribute by gracing us with your presence.

Please don’t send resumes, photos, or attachments! Shoot the email to intern at boygeniusreport dot com and if we’re interested we’ll get back to you!

Last August, Microsoft and Nokia teamed up to bring Microsoft Office functionality to Nokia’s smartphone lineup. The first fruits of this joint venture have come in the form of the newly announced Microsoft Communicator Mobile. Just as the name implies, Communicator Mobile will improve the peer-to-peer communication within Nokia’s Symbian-powered handsets by allowing users to view a colleague’s current status, check their availability on a certain date, and launch an IM session, send a text, or write an email from within the contact card. The mobile communications client will be available initially from the Ovi Store for Nokia’s E71 and E72 handsets, while future E-Series handsets will ship with Communicator Mobile pre-installed.

Read

Over the past few days we’ve been playing around the latest beta release of Microsoft Office for Mac 2011. Many of the changes made are hard to appreciate without actually seeing the application suite in use, and for that reason alone we have assembled a massive gallery of screenshots. On the other hand, images can be meaningless without a bit of an explanation so we’ve put down a brief summary of our initial thoughts. You can check them all out after the jump.

Across the board, each application has had its UI completely overhauled as Microsoft has made the wise decision to redo the entire layout of the application suite. Instead of the awful configuration found in Office for Mac 2008, 2011 draws from both Office 2007 and Office 2010 for Windows. In fact, it did such a good job that we can’t think of a reason why someone who is used to one OS wouldn’t be able to jump into the other and get work done in Office. One of the main reasons for this is Ribbons. Microsoft has finally conceded that people don’t like using the attractive but horribly implemented Toolbox found in previous versions of Office for Mac. Yes, the option to use the Toolbox is still there, but it’s no longer nearly impossible to get away without using it. One nice thing we will say about the Toolbox is that if you’re heavily into incorporating multimedia into your documents, the Toolbox is now fully integrated with iPhoto, iTunes, Photo Booth and Garage Band. It works phenomenally well. Speaking of things working, Excel finally has working support for macros. We can’t even tell you how happy this makes nerds like us. But back to Ribbons. They just make life so much easier. Basically every option you could ever want to use is attractively presented to you through the ribbons. What this does is allow you to save yourself an awful lot of time navigating the menu bar, hence why Microsoft calls the Ribbon a “Fluent User Interface”.

Sadly there is a pretty big weak link in Office 2011: Outlook. It seems that Microsoft simply sacrificed brains for beauty. Don’t get us wrong. It’s definitely the best and most powerful email client we’ve ever used on OS X, but after using it for 10 minutes we honestly gave up on it. Why? Because it simply requires more work to get simple tasks done than on the Windows version. It sucks to say it, but given the choice between using the new Outlook for Mac and virtualizing Outlook for Windows, we’d go with the latter any day. We’ve got more that 50 screenshots lined up for your eyes to feast upon, so check them out, ok?

Click on over to our Microsoft Office for Mac 2011 gallery!

January 11th was zero hour for Microsoft as the injunction against Word and Office 2007 went into effect. The software giant out of Redmond had indicated that it was prepared for the injunction and would have it products fixed and ready to roll on the injunction date. Despite its good intentions, Microsoft failed to deliver this update and has pulled most of its Office 2007 and Word 2007 products from the shelves of its online store. Microsoft informs customers that these affected Office and Word 2007 versions are being updated and will be returning soon. The software giant advises customers to purchase Office Ultimate for $679 or try out the beta version of Office 2010. Not interested in a suite of software that costs more than your monthly car payment? Hurry on over to Amazon, Newegg and other retailers who, for the time being, are still selling the affected products.

Read