Microsoft is launching Office for Mac 2011 in October in three flavors, company officials said on August 2.
“For better alignment across platforms, the Office 2011 pricing and edition options map closer with Windows Office,” according to Microsoft’s press release.
The three SKUs, or versions — Office for Mac Home & Student 2011, Office for Mac Home & Business 2011 and Office for Mac Academic 2011 — will be available at retail starting in late October. (The Academic version, for students and faculty, will be available via authorized academic stores.)
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The Home and Student version includes Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Messenger and will retail starting at $119 (U.S. estimated retail price, single install only). A Family Pack version, with three installs, will be available for $149. The Home and Business 2011 version includes Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Messenger and Outlook. A single install version will go for $199 and a Multi-Pack with two installs allowed for $279. The Mac Academic 2011 product (single install only) includes Word, PowerPoint, Excel and Messenger and will retail for $99.
Office 2011 will be available in 13 languages, including Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Polish, Russian, Spanish and Swedish. It will be available “in several regions” starting in October, with availability expanded through the rest of the year.
Microsoft also is launching a free upgrade program for users who buy Office 2008 for Mac between August 1, 2010, and November 30, 2010. Those purchasing between those dates from Microsoft or an authorized authorized reseller can register for the program online at http://www.microsoft.com/mac/techg.
Microsoft officials announced in August 2009 that the company was working on a new version of its productivity suite for the Mac. The new suite will include Outlook in place of the current Entourage mail client, support for Microsoft’s information rights management (IRM) content protection, and support for Visual Basic. The suite will be 32-bit only and use a version of the Microsoft Ribbon interface.
