On December 1st Microsoft unveiled the new E5 Plan for Office 365. This new plan from Microsoft will come in at $35 per user per month. You may wonder what's included in this newest offering from Microsoft. The features making the biggest splash are the new voice features like Cloud PBX and PSTN Conferencing.
The Cloud PBX addition will allow you to make, receive, and transfer calls while in the office, on the road, or at home using an IP Phone, PC, or smart phone. Microsoft also introduced an add-on PSTN Calling plan which ranges from $12 per user per month for domestic only calling to $24 per user per month for both domestic and international calling. The PSTN add-on will also allow businesses to use existing phone numbers.
PSTN Conferencing will allow people to join Skype for Business meetings by using landline or cellular devices instead of the need for an Internet connection. This feature is what you've been accustomed to with GoToMeeting or WebEx.
One other service that Microsoft is including in the E5 plan is Advanced Threat Protection, which protects email in real time against unknown and complex attacks. This service has been available as an add-on for the other Office 365 plans ($2 per user per month). Some of the additional protections included with Advanced Threat Protection are Safe Attachments and Safe Links. Safe Attachments is a feature that will use behavioral analysis and machine learning to evaluate attachments for suspicious activity. This protection will allow for more robust protection against zero-day attacks. Safe Links adds another layer of protection by re-writing the URLs to go through Office 365 first. The URLs are analyzed in real time when clicked and the user is warned or blocked from going to unsafe sites.
Look for the Cloud PBX and voice features of the Office 365 E5 plan to expand quickly like their other services have.