GM And Google Apps: Buckled In?GM And Google Apps: Buckled In?

Office 365 Vs. Google Apps: Top 10 Enterprise Concerns

Google has reportedly signed a deal with General Motors to provide more than 100,000 GM employees with its online email and productivity software, Google Apps.

The Wall Street Journal, citing unnamed sources, said that the contract is contingent upon requirements that have not been made public. If the deal goes through, it would be a huge vote of confidence in Google Apps and in cloud computing.

Google Apps has had other major customer wins, notably the General Services Administration (GSA), which completed moving some 17,000 employees to Google Apps for Government in July. But GM's size and stature would send a signal that cloud-based IT infrastructure has moved beyond the early adopter stage and that Google Apps is ready to compete for the business of the world's largest companies. It would also be a black eye for IBM's Lotus Notes, GM's current email platform.

[Go Google or double down on Microsoft? Read Google Apps Vs Office 365? It All Depends.]

Google declined to comment.

GM, on the other hand, didn't deny testing Google Apps. "GM's IT organization explores technology capabilities of various developers all the time--we have to in order to be on the leading edge," a company spokesperson said via email. "GM has not made a decision to deploy Google apps."

That's hardly the sort of declaration of commitment to Lotus Notes that IBM would presumably prefer to hear. Asked whether it was aware of GM's rumored interest in Google Apps, IBM did not respond.

Even so, IBM has its defenders. "IBM renews most of its Lotus Notes accounts at this point, and rarely loses a deal," said IDC program director of applications development software Al Hilwa in an email. "IBM's key attraction is the overall portfolio in middleware and portals and specifically what they are doing in socializing the enterprise, which is where a lot of the effort in Lotus is going. The big trumpcard they have over Google is that they can run on-premises."

Google maintains that running software on-premises is more costly, less reliable, and less secure than its cloud-based system. Back in February 2007, when Google launched Google Apps for Business, doubts about the security, reliability, and viability of cloud services were widespread. But these days, with government agencies embracing the cloud and Microsoft pushing Office 365, its cloud-based version of Office, and its Azure platform, the debate has changed.

It wouldn't really be a surprise if GM did drop Lotus Notes for Google Apps. In late 2009, GM CIO Terry Kline recounted a meeting he'd had earlier that year with Eric Schmidt, then CEO of Google, in which he told Schmidt that Google Apps wasn't enterprise-ready. Schmidt asked for a list of requirements and said he'd see that Kline's concerns were addressed. Kline asked for improvements to Google Docs spreadsheets and better data audit trails in the cloud, among other things.

Google didn't immediately respond to a request to provide an update on the extent to which Kline's wish-list has been implemented.

But Kline and other IT executives that information have spoken with clearly see promise in Google Apps. Some no doubt welcome Google Apps as a way to negotiate better prices with Microsoft. But plenty appear to be committed to cloud services once their concerns and requirements have been dealt with to their satisfaction. Kline predicted that Google Apps would become "a legitimate threat" to competing enterprise apps by the second half of 2010, at "a price point that is impressive."

Given the no-holds-barred competition for enterprise customers between Google and Microsoft, Kline's vision of the future appears to have become the present. At the recent Web 2.0 Summit, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer characterized his company's success with Office 365 thus: "We are winning winning winning winning." To prove that point, Microsoft proudly points to companies like retail marketing firm Aisle7, which tried Google Apps and then jumped ship for Microsoft BPOS, the precursor to Office 365.

A spokesperson for Aisle7 didn't respond to a request for comment.

But Google paints a picture of winning too, as can be seen from the its map of Google Apps deployments.

Jason Lee, a partner at Chicago, Ill.-based IT integrator Maven Wave Partners, says that his company's clients are increasingly interested in shifting non-differentiated IT operations to the cloud. In the last 18 to 24 months, he said in a phone interview, the conversation has changed from a desire to experiment to actual deployments. He attributes some of the increased willingness to consider Google Apps to the fact that many businesspeople are using cloud services in their personal lives.

Lee says that while he's not privy to negotiations between Google and GM, he believes the deal will be seen as a huge validation of the cloud if it goes through.

Shea Bennett, CEO of Migration King, a Maryland-based IT consulting organization, says he's 99.9% certain GM will deploy Google Apps. No one at GM would allow a leak like that unless it was to exert pressure on Google to agree to more favorable contractual terms, he suggested.

"Trust and believe they've already made a decision to go Google," he said in a phone interview, characterizing the news as the result of typical IT negotiation tactics. "It's just a matter of taking care of contractual requirements."

Bennett's firm handles IT consulting work for companies interested in Microsoft products and for companies interested in Google products. Bennett, however, makes it clear that Google Apps generates more revenue for his organization than Office 365. "100% of time when the call is about Google products, it always leads to revenue," he said, drawing a contrast with less committed inquiries about Microsoft's offerings.

Google Apps, Bennett suggests, is on a roll. "The momentum of Google Apps has done nothing but accelerate, especially in schools," he said. "Most schools are not even taking a look at Office 365 because it still takes some on-premises software."

Lee notes that the recent introduction of Google+ and Google+ Pages for businesses is also making Google Apps more attractive to organizations.

"It's going to enhance the value proposition of Google Apps because Google+ will be tightly integrated with the collaboration platform," he said.

Google is expected to provide an update on its enterprise business on Monday, November 14, at an event called Atmosphere, which is being held at the company's Mountain View, Calif., headquarters.