The Next Phase of Evolution: Office 365’s Newest Plan and What It Means For Businesses

In-depth reporting, real-time data analysis, increased security threat management, and enriched daily business communications. Businesses large and small strive to grow and advance their organizations with these tools, which are among the new key features in Microsoft’s recently released enterprise plan for Office 365: E5.

Announced mid-last year and now available to partners and customers, this plan is a robust suite that offers enhancements to better refine business practices, lower over-head expenses, and provide valuable insight into operations. Check out some of the newest features below:

Enhanced Data Collection and Analysis

Microsoft’s latest plan provides a richer offering for businesses to explore their data and discover recurring trends. Included in this suite is Power BI Pro, offering live analytics and visualization in a singular interface. Also included is Delve analytics, which allows users to dive head first into personalized insights, such as email response rate, time spent in meeting, and hours spent on emails.

What this means for you: With personalized and organizational insights and a live 360-degree view of your business, trends can be discovered and used to improve processes and efficiency. If you and your team are constantly spending time in meetings, yet few documents or emails are being created or sent, you may learn that these meetings are not as beneficial or productive as expected. The enhanced data analysis included with this offering empowers businesses to discover trends in real-time, determine why data is trending positively or negatively, and use these insights to implement change and forecast for the future.

Advanced Security Protection

Security is an ever-growing and constant concern, and E5 offers a new level of security for the Office 365 plan which provides businesses with advanced protection. Through the customer lock box, all access control activities and data control can be logged to ensure the right people can access the right information. Advanced Threat Protection defends in real-time against unknown malware and viruses and includes rich reporting and URL trace capabilities. Office 365 Advanced eDiscovery utilizes predictive coding and machine learning to train the system to find relevant data and identify data relationships.

What this means for you: The newest security features add an additional layer of protection for Office 365 and your business. This advanced layer works to prevent network and data infiltration and supports a businesses’ adaptive security architecture, which is essential to protecting against attacks. The new tools provide extra alerts and monitoring, and expose threats to businesses and their customers. This is valuable for any business in any industry, but especially for those who are in a regulated industry or have a highly mobile workforce.

New Ways to Connect

One of the new and advanced elements that E5 is offering is Cloud PBX through Skype for Business. This cloud-based call management allows businesses to reduce on-premise PBX systems and make, receive, and transfer calls across a wide range of devices as well as share audio, video, content, and messaging. This system offers PSTN conferencing, which allows for dial-in from anywhere, whether it is through a landline or a mobile phone.

What this means for you: By using a cloud-based system, your business can cut-down on phone system-related costs, as well as solve communication problems that you may have with your remote employees. The offerings of E5 provide the opportunity for modern collaboration with single-click conferencing and enriched content sharing features, as well as the ability to join conferences from any device or hold meetings with up to 10,000 people. These features make communications easier for both on-site and remote employees.

Microsoft’s E5 expands the Office 365 suite offerings for enterprise businesses. Think you’re ready to upgrade to E5? Call us today for a try-before-you-buy trial with a Microsoft Customer Immersion Experience (CIE) to see if it is a right fit for you.