The alliance between one of the oldest and the latest adversaries of Microsoft can lead to a full fledged war fare against Microsoft Office Suite applications. Though Google and Sun do not have firm commitments on the future of the partnership they left room for enough speculation. It will be interesting to see where and how the new alliance can launch a new suite that can rival MS Office suite.

Google and Sun are proposing a newer version of Open Office suite that will be a credible alternative to MS Office suite. The fact that the existing Open Office Suite is virtually free will be more compelling to individuals and small businesses.

The most difficult part is to challenge the well established standards usage habits promoted by MS in creating and sharing office documents. The actual chink in the armor for MS could be its Mail Exchange products that are integrated seamlessly with its Office products. Compatibility of any new office suite with MS will be a difficult task.