MSPmentor

Google vs. Microsoft? That’s so 2010. With the launch of Google Message Continuity, the search giant’s Postini message services arm ads “Gmail’s reliability” to on-premises Microsoft Exchange 2003 or 2007 deployments. With the two working in concert, Exchange messages are backed up to Google’s cloud and can be accessed in a Gmail-like interface that can be accessed from anywhere, Google asserts. Here’s the scoop.

The Google Message Continuity solution isn’t entirely the olive branch it might seem to be. Instead, Google’s priced the continuity solution to move, at $25/user/year for new customers or $13/user/year for existing Postini anti-spam/anti-virus clients. And the official Google Enterprise Blog post on the matter says they see it as a bridge for enterprises planning on making the move from Microsoft Exchange to the Google Apps cloud suite down the line.

The value proposition of the offering in general, though, is simple: by synchronizing those messages, you can still access the data from the browser even in the event of Microsoft Exchange server outage. Google’s claimed in the past that Gmail is 10 times more reliable than Exchange, which makes this offering a very sly but nonetheless potentially valuable addition to the offering for MSPs and end-users alike.

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