K World

[The following information is collected from various sources, believe at your own risk]

Google made it easier for companies to migrate their legacy email systems to Google Apps by offering an Email Migration API. This is what Google tells about their API

The Email Migration API enables you to migrate email from any data source into Google Apps. You can write extraction code which operates against an email server data store, interface protocol, or email client data store, then, using this API, upload the email messages to a target mailbox, specifying the correct labels, date, and status. The Email Migration API supports both end user tools and administrative tools. This API is only available in Google Apps Premier, Education and Partner Editions.

The new migration tool will move emails in any system including Outlook or any type of server to Google Apps (all editions other than the free one)

In releasing the new API, Google appears to understand that any mid- or large-sized company would be reluctant to rip and replace its current e-mail server with another system. However, by allowing a company to run both systems concurrently, Google may have ameliorated a major concern [1]

In order to convince the mid-or large-sized companies, they are currently offering Postini for free, which assures safety. They indeed have proved that Large companies can trust them by making Capgemini their customer.

Google has got complete “army” of tools for Google Apps to fight with Microsoft Exchange or Lotus Domino or any other Email solutions. If you take a look a the Google Apps Solutions page, they listed a solutions category wise which will do your work at some price if you are not willing to invest money in developing something using the APIs released.

A small research on available solutions and cost

Google Apps Premier Edition which includes Gmail (25 Gigabyte-mail-box with IMAP, POP support ), Google Talk, Google Calendar, Google Docs, Page Creator and Start Page, Policy management and message recover by Postini, SSO, Migration, User Provisioning and Management, email gateway support etc., costs $50/user/year.

According to a source, similar services on Microsoft Exchange Hosted Service costs around $23/user/month. Over all, there is a huge cost difference. Big companies might prefer in-house services rather than outsourcing their emails to other hosts. Companies like Accenture and Wipro have migrated a while ago from Lotus Notes to Microsoft Exchange to reduce their cost, enhance security and for some other added advantages. However, I couldn’t get much data on cost-per-user for Exchange and Lotus, but, as per this report, in-house deployment of Exchange will cost around $438 per/user/3Years and IBM’s solution costs $406 per/user/3Years.

These are results. (I’m damn sure that they aren’t correct, but atleast, they might give you an idea. And, cost of in-house solutions are indicated along with hardware and running costs. Software only costs are just the licensing costs) However, the sizes of email boxes are different, Google Apps at 25GB and remaining at less than 500MB or reaching a max of 3.6GB per box.

Apart from some disadvantages, Google Apps looks like a very good option. Good Luck Google. Who could have expected a search engine to start a webmail service give a Gigabyte box, scare every other webmail service provider, slowly convert it into a collaboration suite, offer it to enterprise customers for decent price and scare the companies who are in this business from long time. Well, I’ve done some work which is not quite my type of research. Now, going back to read about those APIs.