Microsoft’s Professional Developer Conference announced, among other things, the upcoming release of the new Office 14. The new edition brings innovative Web applications meant to distance itself once again from the competition composed of Zoho’s Office and Google’s Docs.

Users will be able to use Excel, Powerpoint, Word and OneNote in their Web browser simultaneously with other collaborators, making certain tasks a lot easier. All the programs will allow a better collaboration among users and also more efficiency across multiple devices. "This is a great example of Office enabling dynamic collaboration across the PC, phone, and the Web," explained Takeshi Numoto, Microsoft Office general manager.

The company announced that the online app will be compatible with Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari and it is believed that Google’s Chrome will also be included on the list.

For now, the release date has not yet been announced, but it is expected sometime in early 2009. The same policy was adopted for the pricing details, which are also expected later this year, as there are probably certain aspects that still demand the officials’ attention.

The competition is strong and Google’s Apps service, launched last year, provides several free and low-cost office productivity applications which have been received with great enthusiasm by Internet surfers. What companies are looking to offer their users now is less complexity and a far easier maintenance.

Microsoft’s PDC was mainly focused on details about the upcoming Windows 7 and also the new Windows Azure platform, which will allow third-party developers to store and manage data for Web-running apps via Microsoft’s data centers.