Hosted Exchange Email and BPOS just got cheaper. 

Microsoft has just announced a price reduction in their hosted solutions including hosted Exchange.

Is this the start of a price war amongst SaaS vendors?

Looking at some of the current UK offerings for hosted exchange the price is around £9.99 per user per month. Of course, some companies are cheaper than this, but if someone is offering hosted exchange you need to make sure they have the infrastructure to properly support it. Some of the cheaper companies are probably using their own servers, in dusty server rooms, to host the service. Also, they are probably not going to upgrade to the latest versions and security patches as soon as they are released. What if they have a problem? Is their support up to scratch? Many suppliers will be fine, but others may not.

With Microsoft hosted services you can rely on the service being hosted in geo-redundant data-centers, that it will be upgraded to the latest versions and patch levels and that they have the right people to support the infrastructure.

So, is that going to cost more? NO!

As a Microsoft reseller we are able to offer Hosted Exchange email (with anti-virus and anti-spam) that costs just £3.35 per user per month.

We can also offer the whole Microsoft Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) for £6.71 per user per month.

BPOS includes Hosted Exchange Email (with anti-virus and anti-spam), document storage and management via Sharepoint, hosted web conferencing services such as real-time meetings, training sessions, and events via Office Live meeting, plus instant messaging via Office Communications Online? Put this all together and you have an integrated, joined up communications system that works from any internet connected device. All this for less than most people charge for just hosted exchange email.

What's the catch?

Only that these services are offered with a minimum of 5 user accounts. So, for 5 hosted exchange accounts that's £16.75 per month. For 5 BPOS accounts that's £33.55 per month.

So, if you're using hosted exchange email and are thinking about switching to hosted exchange email, or are currently using a Small Business Server one of the above packages could save you money, and at the same time improve your communication systems.

If you would like to know more about BPOS or Hosted Exchange Email please click here.