Box nixes storage limits for businesses, strengthens ties to Office 365
Box is tying up some loose ends while also relaxing a bit elsewhere this week.
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For starters, the cloud provider is nixing storage limits on all companies subscribing to the "Business" plan, just one rung down the pricing ladder from Enterprise.
Box has already been offering unlimited storage space to Enterprise customers since 2010, most recently starting at $35 per user per month. Up until now, Business came with a cap of 1,000 gigabytes and a rate of $15 per user per month.
The free-for-all on cloud space is now available to all current and future Business plan customers.
In many respects, Box has little choice but to raise caps and limits. Big players ranging from Microsoft to Google to Amazon are all getting into the file sharing and collaboration game. Pure plays such as Box and Dropbox have focus, but may have difficulty competing with the scale of much larger competitors. Box has been partnering with the likes of VMware and others to maintain its focus and position.
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Among the recent developments:
- Amazon got into the file sharing game via mobile tools and cloud applications.
- Google upended the cloud storage market by increasing the default storage allotted for free Google Drive accounts to 15 GB and cutting the upgrade price by 80 percent.
- Apple announced a new iCloud Drive that will cut the price of 200 GB of storage to $4 a month (the same price per gigabyte as Google) when it goes live this fall.
- Microsoft matched Google and now offers 15 GB of free space for OneDrive.
Box is also rounding out some edges (and maybe unruffling some feathers with a casual foe) through two new integrations with Office 365.
Box for Office 2013 Desktop will enable users to be able to edit, manage and share any file stored on Box within Office 2013 desktop apps, including Word, Powerpoint, and Excel.
Box For Outlook 2013 Desktop is designed to streamline access to content stored on Box. Users can share links to files stored on the cloud platform and convert attachments within the email program.
One last bit of work, Box also tacked on an integration with enterprise compliance and governance software provider AvePoint. Businesses could now use DocAve Cloud Connect to link up instances of Box and SharePoint for accessing all of that content in a single location.
The AvePoint DocAve Cloud Connect integration will be available first and immediately. The Microsoft Office 365 tie-ins are scheduled to be ready in beta mode this fall. Box promised more integrations for Office Online will follow in the coming months.