Microsoft Office 2013 reaches to manufacturers, coming to public in Q1 2013

Microsoft announced on Thursday that it has completed the Release to Manufacturing (RTM) build of the new Office. The current release includes new Office 365 service, Office 2013 clients, SharePoint 2013, Exchange 2013, Lync 2013, Project 2013, and Visio 2013.

"This is the most ambitious release of Office we've ever done. It spans the full family of Office applications, servers and cloud services. The new Office has a fresh, touch friendly design that works beautifully on Windows 8 and unlocks modern scenarios in social, reading, note-taking, meetings and communications," stated Microsoft in a blog post.

According to Microsoft, enterprise customers will be the first after manufacturers to get the new Office at the end of this month. It also stated that consumers who purchase a Windows 8 RT device will get Office Home & Student 2013 RT.

General availability of Office 2013 is planned for the first quarter of 2013, company mentioned in a blog post.

If you purchase Office 2010 from local retailers or resellers on or after October 19, you will be eligible for a free upgrade to Office 2013.

Microsoft has also revealed the availability details for volume-licencing customers as well as professionals and devs.

Volume Licensing customers with Software Assurance will be able to download the Office 2013 applications as well as other Office products including SharePoint 2013, Lync 2013 and Exchange 2013 through the Volume Licensing Service Center by mid-November. These products will be available on the Volume Licensing price list on December 1.

IT professionals and developers will be able to download the final version via their TechNet or MSDN subscriptions by mid-November.