Technical beta available only to nominated customers and partners worldwide.

Microsoft Corp., today announced the technical beta release of their new Office system, Office '12'.

Microsoft Office '12' will expand on the benefits of Office 2003, but will remain an integrated set of programs, servers and services designed to empower people to get better results more quickly. The company claims that Microsoft Office '12' helps improve information workers' productivity through a new results-oriented user interface, powerful graphics, diagramming engines, advanced task and information management tools.

In addition, by enhancing business intelligence, collaboration and enterprise content management capabilities within Office '12', there are new solutions to help customers control content, streamline business processes, collaborate across organizational boundaries and make more-informed decisions.

"Office '12' will redefine the Office experience. The next version of Office is the most significant release in more than 10 years and includes new technologies designed to allow information workers to drive greater business success. Now, after many years of research and development, we're eager to put the software to the test and solicit technical feedback from select customers and partners." said Chris Capossela, Corporate Vice President of the Information Worker Product Management Group at Microsoft.