What you need to know
- Microsoft holding a digital-event on March 30th.
- Focuses on being "productive across work, life, and family."
- No Surface or new hardware is expected for this event.
Microsoft is holding an online event on Monday, March 30 at 8AM PT/11AM ET, to talk about "how to be more productive across work, life, and family." Due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, it sounds like Microsoft wanted to hold the occasion in-person for media but has instead wisely shifted to a digital briefing format.
As to what to expect on March 30, new Surface hardware is likely out of the picture. While such an event is still likely to occur later this spring, Microsoft seems to be focusing here on just software and services.
Turing to that angle rumors of Microsoft Teams "for Life" – a consumer and family-focused version of Microsoft Teams – seems more likely (and relevant as people are on lockdown). Rumors of Teams for friends and family go back to June 2019, and it seems Microsoft is now ready to reveal how it works, and why families would want it.
The idea behind Teams for Life is families and non-enterprise groups can use the service for real-time chat, shared calendar, links to Microsoft Office products like Word and PowerPoint, to stay in touch and communicate.
"Teams for Life" is expected to play into Microsoft's more extensive play of Microsoft 365 for consumers. While currently there is Office 365 for consumers, Microsoft 365 is a more encompassing package. As reported in December:
According to (Mary Jo) Foley (at ZDNet)), the consumer version of Microsoft 365 will be branded as Microsoft 365 Life and will "largely be a rebrand of the existing Office 365 Personal and Home products." Foley also expects the subscription's pricing to line up with that of Office 365.
Rumors of other features like a password manager and possibly a more sophisticated grammar checker have also been reported.
Tune into Windows Central on March 30th for more information as Microsoft prepares for the event.
