Facebook's 13,000 Employees to Shift to Microsoft's Office 365

Facebook next week is expected to announce that its 13,000 employees will shift to Microsoft's Office 365. The social giant has "signed a deal" to use Microsoft's Web-based productivity suite.

WSJ reports that Facebook's 13,000 employees will use some portions of Office 365 such as the email and calendar. The report however says that Facebook will not use Microsoft's Yammer as it competes with the company's Facebook at Work service. Launched last year, Facebook at Work is a new way for teams to collaborate effectively at work. The report describes email as "inherently top-down" compared to the Facebook at Work service.

Facebook's Timothy Campos, Chief Information Officer, told WSJ, "Facebook at Work doesn't end the need for email. It's not a binary thing." Campos revealed that employees use "Facebook at Work internally" but added that email still has its place.

He adds that shift to Office 365 will help the company to use Microsoft's Delve app, which lets colleagues see who is working on across Office 365 and also suggests documents that will be relevant to employees. Campos pointed that Delve will help "keep the noise level down."

The report also quoted Microsoft's Kirk Koenigsbauer, Corporate Vice Pesident of Office Marketing who claimed "Email isn't dead." Koenigsbauer however referred that the companies have evolved their email usage, and now utilise "social network-style services."

In May, Facebook was said to launch Facebook at Work in India soon, and the Indian market was also said to be the top priority country for the service. The social giant said that it will soon start testing the app in India.