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Samsung is bundling Microsoft's Office apps on some Android tablets

Samsung is bundling Microsoft's Office apps on some Android tablets

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Samsung is expanding on its recent partnership with Microsoft to preinstall Office on select Android tablets. The move follows a similar bundling on Samsung’s Galaxy S6 handsets, with Microsoft's Skype, OneDrive, and OneNote apps preinstalled in a special "Microsoft Apps" folder that is pinned on the homescreen. Samsung will start preinstalling Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OneNote, OneDrive, and Skype on "select Android tablets" in the first half of this year, with plans to offer Microsoft’s Office 365 service to businesses that opt for Samsung devices.

"Our partnership with Samsung is emblematic of our efforts to bring the best of Microsoft's productivity services to everyone, on every device, so people can be productive wherever, however and whenever they want," explains Peggy Johnson, Microsoft’s head of business development. While the partnership clearly backs up Microsoft’s plans to have Office everywhere, it comes just over a month after Samsung and Microsoft ended a bitter Android royalties dispute. Both companies announced the end of their contract dispute in a join statement last month, but kept the fresh deal terms confidential. Part of the court case revealed that Microsoft earned $1 billion from Samsung in the form of patent-licensing loyalties during 2013.

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