In a recent announcement from FVC, the company selected Microsoft (News - Alert) as its exclusive partner for cloud and UC technologies. With this partnership, the two will provide businesses in the Gulf area with improved access to Office 365, helping customers take advantage of the cloud with a complete set of solutions.

As the SME sector tends to have little to no IT support, and less time or resources to dedicate to technology, Microsoft has been making attempts to deliver Office 365. As a result, companies in the SME region have seen improved communications and productivity with reduced costs, thanks to all the collaboration tools and UC capabilities it presents.

Thanks to this new partnership, businesses in the Gulf will have access to e-mail, instant messaging, and collaboration tools, as well as UC solutions with Polycom (News - Alert)-Lync integrated solutions. As it’s based on productivity tools that are familiar to most people, it’s an easy and effective way to move to the cloud, letting employees work together on any device and applications they’re familiar with.

"Microsoft's cloud computing solutions, such as Office 365, are geared to support emerging economies in the region and accelerate the growth of local innovation industries,” says Samer Abu Ltaif, Regional GM of Microsoft Gulf.

“Office365 offers customers choices in how their communications and collaboration software is delivered, managed, and maintained. We are very happy to be extending our partnership with FVC across the region to support and enable businesses to improve their productivity. As more businesses are using the Cloud to enhance their productivity, we are certain that greater need for tools like Microsoft Office, Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Lync Online will enable seamless and continued collaboration among businesses while helping them reduce costs."

This is a great deal for Microsoft, essentially opening up the entire region. Of course, customers in the Gulf region will greatly benefit from everything Office 365 can provide, so it will be quite helpful to all of them. With all the collaboration and communications software now at their disposal, customers there will be thanking FVC and Microsoft soon enough.