NZ Launch Of Microsoft Office XP

New Zealand Kicks Off Worldwide Launch Of Microsoft Office XP
Microsoft New Zealand Employees To Make Surprise Visits To 500 Offices
Around The Country With Free Copies Of Office XP

AUCKLAND, New Zealand - Wednesday, May 30, 2001 - Microsoft New Zealand announced today that Office XP, the latest generation of Microsoft's Office productivity suite, will be available tomorrow morning in retail stores throughout the nation. As May 31 dawns, New Zealanders will be the first people in the world to have access to Office XP, which will enable them to boost productivity, simplify collaboration and find better ways to meet their business needs.

As part of the New Zealand launch, every one of Microsoft New Zealand's employees will be visiting customers and partners across New Zealand to present 500 CEOs and CIOs with gift copies of Office XP.

"Office XP is going to change the way Kiwis do business," said Ross Peat, Microsoft New Zealand's Director of Sales and Marketing. "This is the first place on the planet to have Office XP commercially available, and the whole company is excited about it. Now we can share the product's time saving innovations with New Zealanders."

Office XP simplifies the way people work by empowering individuals to put more of the product to work for them and giving them greater control over the way Office works.

"Our customers told us that they spend the majority of their workday either creating or searching for information," said Bridget Reeves, Microsoft New Zealand's Senior Product Marketing Manager. "Office XP is designed to simplify this process as much as possible by making the capabilities of Office more accessible. New features like Smart Tags and Task Panes make it easier for users to retrieve information and complete tasks, while SharePoint Team Services give colleagues the tools they need to share knowledge and work together."

New Zealand Connections Not only are New Zealanders the first in the world to be able to buy Office XP, but a piece of New Zealand software is being promoted by Microsoft as a great way to expand the power of Office.

Auckland-based software developer, Keylogix, has partnered with Microsoft to enable companies to create their own Smart Tags. Microsoft has recognised the Keylogix application, ActiveDocs, as an asset to all businesses and is including ActiveDocs marketing collateral in a million of boxes of Office XP distributed throughout the United States.

"ActiveDocs will give organisations the opportunity to tailor Smart Tags to meet their individual needs without having to call in a programmer," said Dot Johnstone, co-founder of Keylogix. "We're proud to be connected so closely with Office XP. The fact that ActiveDocs has been identified by Microsoft as a key strength for one of its core products speaks volumes about the quality of ActiveDocs and the potential contribution that Kiwi developers like us can make to the industry as a whole."

Dot Johnstone is one of a select few Microsoft partners invited to demonstrate with Microsoft at their US launch. At the West Coast launch in San Francisco, Dot will be showing ActiveDocs to more than 2000 people in the largest iMax theatre in the United States.

Office XP Product and Pricing Details Microsoft designed the Office XP suite to deliver a simplified and streamlined experience based on customer feedback. Customers will have a range of options to choose from, so they can select the Office XP suite that best suits their needs:

* Microsoft Office XP Standard. Office XP Standard is designed for users requiring a core set of desktop productivity tools and includes Microsoft Word 2002, Microsoft Excel 2002, the Microsoft Outlook® 2002 messaging and collaboration client, and the Microsoft PowerPoint® 2002 presentation graphics program.

Office XP Standard Upgrade: $689 including GST Office XP Standard Full version: $1379 including GST

* Microsoft Office XP Professional. Office XP Professional is the most complete solution for customers, offering exciting new features in Word 2002, Excel 2002, PowerPoint 2002, Outlook 2002 and Access 2002.

Office XP Professional Upgrade: $969 including GST Office XP Professional Full version: $1659 including GST Office XP Professional Subscription: $439 including GST

About Office XP Office XP presents people with the tools they need to work smarter. Office XP greatly improves personal productivity through simplifying the way people work and providing tools that people can rely on; enables collaboration by making it easy to collaborate on documents and work more effectively with others; and extends Office beyond the desktop by enabling people to integrate additional services into Office and easily access information any time. Office XP will be broadly available in New Zealand and worldwide on 31 May 2001.

About Microsoft Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq "MSFT") is the worldwide leader in software, services and Internet technologies for personal and business computing. The company offers a wide range of products and services designed to empower people through great software - any time, any place and on any device.

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