Gone Google

At the Clift Hotel in San Francisco, Google is busy trying to convince a group of journalists that companies love Google Apps. The setting speaks of success -- the Spanish Suite at the Clift is the sort of complex that would house a Saudi sheik's entourage. The message is that Google means businesses.Google's Dave Girouard, who heads Google's enterprise group, is making the case that Google Apps costs less, innovates more, and leads to happier end users.

It's a story Google has been telling since the enterprise group began in 2004, but lately big companies have been listening and moving to Google Apps.

Well, today Google is making it even easier: They're launching Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook. It allows Gmail users to use Outlook as a client.

"One of the things we want to do was making it really easy for businesses to adopt Google," explained Girouard. "It's the Microsoft Outlook experience in the front, it's the Gmail experience in the back."

Bob Rudy, VP and CIO of Avago, calls this the last hurdle to letting go of Exchange.

Uh, oh.

More on this shortly.