As Google last week introduced new features for its online and Android productivity apps, it also quietly announced that it has halted development on Quickoffice and would soon pull the free software from the Google Play and Apple App Store.
Google on Thursday released new Android and iOS versions of its Quickoffice app, a mobile-only alternative to Microsoft's Office suite, and announced they are now free for the taking.
Google yesterday released an add-on that lets users view Microsoft Office documents within its Chrome browser, another small step in the search giant's encroachment on Microsoft's lucrative business productivity turf.
A purported Microsoft roadmap for future releases of its Office suite showed a fall 2014 launch date for Office on Apple's iOS and Google's Android mobile operating systems, according to an online report.
Google launched its Microsoft Office substitute, Quickoffice, for Apple's iPhone, Android smartphones and Android tablets, fulfilling a promise made in December.
It's hard to overstate the impact of the Microsoft Office for iPad. The arrival of the dominant productivity suite on the dominant tablet promises to change how iPads are viewed in the enterprise. Office for iPad may also crush competitive apps, shut out Cloud storage providers and limit MDM vendors.
Google last week again turned the screws on Microsoft and its Office franchise, this time by including Quickoffice with its newest Android mobile operating system, version 4.4 and dubbed "KitKat."