Microsoft Seeks to Standardize Office Format

09:15 PM EST November 23, 2005
Associated Press

SEATTLE
Microsoft Corp. is seeking to standardize the document format used for
its popular Office products, partly in response to concerns that
documents stored using its proprietary technology may be difficult to
access in years to come.

The company's proposal to Ecma International, a Geneva-based industry
group that develops and publishes technical standards, would make
Microsoft Office Open XML an international standard.

Alan Yates, general manager of information worker strategy at
Microsoft, said the company would then provide a simple, free license
to anyone who wants it, making it easy for others - including possibly
rival companies - to build products and other ways to access the
information.

The move comes as companies and governments are growing more concerned
that electronic information will be hard to access if intellectual
property concerns, compatibility problems or other issues come up
years from now.

A document stored today, for instance, might not be readable at all 10
or 15 years from now if Microsoft decides to change its formats and
computers no longer exist to run today's versions of Microsoft
products. Publishing the standards leaves open the possibility that
someone else would develop programs then to run today's formats.

"It gives them the confidence that there is a foundation for documents
that is not controlled by just one company but is a real consensus
within the industry," Yates said.

It's a similar strategy taken by Adobe Systems Inc. and its widely
used PDF format. Adobe publishes details about its format so anyone
else can create compatible programs.

In Massachusetts, Gov. Mitt Romney's administration has directed state
executive offices to begin storing new records by Jan. 1, 2007, in an
open, proprietary-free format called OpenDocument, in response to such
concerns.

That's been widely seen as a blow to Microsoft, whose Office line of
word processing, spreadsheet and other business applications dominates
the market.

Yates said the company is hoping to hear from the standards body in
nine to 18 months.

The proposal is backed by companies including Apple Computer Inc.,
Intel Corp. and Barclays Capital, the investment banking division of
Barclays Bank PLC.