The Macintosh Business Unit (Mac BU) at Microsoft today announced at the Apple Expo in Paris its product lineup for the upcoming Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac release.

The flagship product, Office 2008 for Mac, is the core suite that includes Microsoft Office Word 2008, Microsoft Office Excel 2008, Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2008 and Microsoft Office Entourage 2008. A new combination for Mac users is Office 2008 for Mac Special Media Edition, which features the Office 2008 applications together with the Microsoft Expression Media digital asset management system. Office 2008 for Mac Special Media Edition is geared toward professional users who need Microsoft Exchange Server support and Automator tools and are looking for one product to meet their productivity needs. Completing the product lineup is Office 2008 for Mac Home and Student Edition, a specially priced version for users with basic productivity needs.

All versions of Office 2008 for Mac support the new Open XML file format and are Universal applications that will perform natively on Power PC- and Intel-based Macs. Each version will be available in Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, Swedish, and, for the first time, in the Nordic languages (Danish, Finnish and Norwegian).

Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac will be available in the United States beginning Jan. 15, 2008, with global general availability in the first quarter of 2008. There also are specially priced upgrade versions for legally licensed users of previous versions.

- Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac, $399.95 (U.S.) for the full retail version; $239.95 (U.S.) for the upgrade version

- Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac Home and Student Edition, $149.95 (U.S.) for the full retail version

- Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac Special Media Edition, $499.95 (U.S.) for the full retail version; $299.95 (U.S.) for the upgrade version