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The Case for Apple Software in the Workplace

While the public perception is that Macintosh users are a world apart from mainstream computing, the Mac and PC worlds appear to be drawing closer together as technology continues to converge. Even though Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) software sells to a much smaller user base than Windows products, Macintosh users generally face no shortage of business and productivity software options.

Macintosh software remains very viable for small business and enterprise users, according to Yankee Group analyst Laura DiDio. This is especially the case for vertical applications targeting graphics, art, marketing and advertising professionals.

"It also works just fine for general purpose office applications, though in the past, the price premium associated with Macintosh desktops and laptops was a gating factor in more widespread deployment," DiDio told MacNewsWorld.

Part of the reason for Apple software products' staying power is that Macintosh computers have run mainstream Windows-based applications like Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Office for years, she said. Perhaps a bigger reason for Apple's viability is that both Macintosh systems and their software are extremely user-friendly.

"This makes it easy for individual end users to self-manage their Macs," DiDio emphasized. "However, it should be noted that any organization that deploys a large contingent of Macs and the accompanying Mac OS software and applications is well advised to employ the services of a trained Macintosh IT professional."

Biz Apps Hard to Come By

An old perception is that business users of the Macintosh platform had limited software options. While that view is not a true picture of the Apple software market today, business users must be prepared for some tradeoffs.

Macintosh software is readily available for many, but not all, mainstream applications, DiDio declared. For instance, specialized vertical fields such as legal, healthcare , financial, insurance and defense may be hard pressed to find commercially available applications that run on Macs.

"This is mainly because Apple has not had a presence among these markets," DiDio said. "However, that does not preclude an organization that is committed to the Macintosh from doing its own custom development at a premium."

Graphics Advantage

Since the advent of the iPod, the Macintosh/Apple platform has enjoyed a modest resurgence in corporate environments, according to DiDio. Increasingly, individual knowledge workers are approaching their IT managers with the request that they be allowed to use their own personal Macintosh systems as their office desktop or that the company purchase a Macintosh for them.

"At this point, we are talking about an increase of several Macintoshes in the typical office environment, not dozens or hundreds. But there is no doubt that Apple's Macintosh market share has increased by approximately 1 percent to 1.5 percent of the global installed base over the last 12 to 18 months," explained DiDio.

Another strong selling point for Macintosh hardware and software is the operating system, she noted. Apple continues to refresh and enhance the core Mac OS X operating system with a variety of leading-edge features. These include its signature graphics capabilities, often praised as second to none in the industry. The extremely fast search engine and tabbing functionality are also strong selling points.

Microsoft and Mac Together

Perhaps one of the most popular business productivity staples for the Apple architecture is Microsoft's Mac Office Suite. The Windows master, one of Apple's biggest competitors, is also one of its staunchest software allies.

"We have a great relationship with the Apple corporation," boasted Sheridan Jones, the lead marketing manager for Microsoft's Macintosh Business Unit. "We recently signed a technical agreement to continue developing the Office software for the Macintosh for the next five years."

Microsoft's success with Mac Office software may be traced to its development strategy, Jones said. Microsoft does not port its Windows product versions onto the Mac OS architecture. "Instead, we create the application specifically for the Macintosh customers," he explained.

As a result, the Macintosh Office suite contains many Mac-first and Mac-only features.

A Place for Everything

One of the major enhancements to the Mac Office line is a feature dubbed the "Project Center." All documents, information, e-mails and other data associated with a single project are catalogued together. Thus, all related information stays in one place.

"The data doesn't actually move from where the user initially stored it on the hard drive," said Jones. "The software just meta tags it for virtual collection. Everything is color coded."

The Project Center concept has countless uses in both business and home situations. Another tool related to the Project Center is the Compatibility Report. This feature lets users know if data files produced by any of the Office programs -- PowerPoint, Word, Excel , for instance -- will display properly in the Windows environment.

If a problem is identified, a Compatibility Report component fixes the problem so the data is interoperable.

The Cost Factor

The recent deployment of an Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) processor that runs Windows applications, coupled with the release of Apple's Boot Camp software, adds a new horizon to traditional Macintosh-only software. Apple's Boot Camp installs Microsoft's Windows XP operating system in a partition on the Mac hard drive. This gives Mac users the option of booting up either with OS X or Windows XP.

The success of the iPod has propelled Mac software into making a modest comeback in the corporate workplace, according to DiDio. "They've now got between 4 percent and 5 percent so it's a healthy niche," she claimed.

Pushing improvements to the Mac operating system and dropping the price point are also improving the software market, noted DiDio. Calling Apple's Steve Jobs a fierce competitor, DiDio maintained that Apple continues to refresh and enhance Mac's OS X.

"They've got a terrifically fast search engine, top-notch graphics and wonderfully user-friendly embedded management," she said. "Additionally, Apple has finally dropped the price of its machines a bit."

Prospective customers will still pay a 15 percent to 20 percent premium compared to the average Intel/Windows-based PC or laptop, DiDio acknowledged, "but the price breaks are a start."