Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates doesn’t like Google, and never misses an opportunity to take a dig at them. In his latest jab at the Mountain View search giant, Gates bashed Google Apps, stating that they haven’t a clue how to provide enterprise grade software, and that their application suite is proof of that.
Bill Gates issued these other other scathing remarks at the SharePoint Conference this week at the Washington State Convention & Trade Center.
In terms of Google, not to overstate it, but they really don’t understand the special needs of business. Today, their economic model is based on consumer search. They have done an incredible job there and obviously we’re investing in challenging them in that space. If you’ve seen … the Google tools that have tried to do productivity type things, they really don’t have the richness, the responsiveness. You can see that relative [to] the success they have had there. Most of these Google products, to be frank, the day they announce them is their best day and then after that…” said Gates.
While I’d agree that Google Docs doesn’t offer the full functionality and features you can get with Microsoft Word, how often have any of us ever actually used Word’s more advanced features? For me it typically serves as nothing more than a quick word processor, and I suspect the same may be true for many small businesses. So in that sense, Google Docs serves a purpose and fulfills a need. I don’t use advanced MS Word features, and I no longer even need to buy Microsoft Office to open Word docs. For larger companies that might actually use the advanced features, it is true that Google’s Apps could use some more robust features if they want to make any headway in the enterprise arena.
