(23 February 2008 6:00 pm)

MUMBAI: Software major Microsoft has launched Windows Live SkyDrive at http://skydrive.live.com in 38 countries and regions worldwide including India.

This helps provide consumers free, password-protected online storage and sharing so that they can easily and confidently access their important files from anywhere and share files with the people they choose.

The release of Windows Live SkyDrive builds upon the recent release of a new generation of Windows Live services aimed at providing consumers with a set of tools that help make it easier than ever to communicate and share with the important people in their lives, from anywhere they have web access across multiple devices.

Microsoft Online Services Business country manager Jaspreet Bindra says, "Windows Live SkyDrive is a great way for people to keep the information they need at their fingertips in order to access directly or to share with the people they choose. With more than 400 million customers worldwide using Windows Live services today, Windows Live SkyDrive helps provide consumers an easy and powerful new way to manage, access and share their data with anyone who has an email address."

The new Windows Live SkyDrive offers consumers three ways to store and share files:

Personal folders: Providing anywhere, anytime access to files and information. Consumers can use the personal area to help store information they want to have password-protected access to anytime they are online.

Shared: Shared folders are an easy way to share information with only the people they choose.

Public: Public folders help enable consumers to share files with anyone on the internet.

With the release, Windows Live SkyDrive now offers consumer 5 GB of free online storage, which equates to approximately 1,000 songs, over 30,000 Microsoft Office documents of average size or 30,000 digital photos at a resolution of 1200x1200. There is a 50 MB limit on each file uploaded.

Users in India can now upload any number of files on SkyDrive Beta, which offers up to 5 GB of storage space and then access them from a web browser on any computer as per their convenience through their Windows Live ID. SkyDrive also gives users complete flexibility to keep the files private, share with specific contacts, or make the files accessible to the public.

Microsoft Windows Live India product head Samir Saraiya says, "Windows Live has always been engaged in bringing high-quality user-friendly products for its users. Through Windows Live SkyDrive, we allow our users to have anywhere, anytime access to their files and information on the web. SkyDrive service allows users to limit access to the files uploaded, allowing them to keep the files private, share with contacts, or make the files public, thereby releasing them from the tension of losing their confidential data."

Windows Live SkyDrive will be of use to students who use the internet to research for projects or do schoolwork. This tool allows them to save their work and share it with specific friends, who can access the same information, thus allowing them to collaborate online.

SkyDrive is also a great tool for professionals to save critical information that they can access on the go like project reports or even their resumes.

Earlier, Windows Live SkyDrive was available in beta with a 1 GB storage limit in the US, UK and India only. With the release of the final service offering, the storage size expands and the service also becomes available in 35 new countries and regions including Canada, France, Spain and Brazil.

Windows Live aims to deliver on Microsoft's vision for harnessing the power of software plus services to enable great consumer experiences for computing. Consumers can find the full set of Windows Live services at http://www.windowslive.com, including web-only services as well as a simple unified download experience for all downloadable services.

This unified download experience helps enable consumers to choose any or all of the downloadable Windows Live applications they want, and automatically keep their software and services up to date as Microsoft continues to deliver new innovations over time.