OneCare combines antivirus, anti-spyware and firewall software with backup features and several tune-up tools for Windows PCs. The product will be sold in the US online and in stores starting Thursday, Microsoft said on Tuesday. The company plans to expand to international markets in the coming 12 months, it said.
"We believe we're creating a new category," Dennis Bonsall, director of product management for OneCare, said in an interview. "It is not about security anymore, but it is about holistic PC care."
OneCare will cost US$49.95 a year for use on up to three PCs in a home, a competitive price compared with rivalling products from traditional security vendors including Symantec, McAfee and Trend Micro. Many retailers plan to offer rebates and other types of promotions that will discount OneCare, Microsoft said in a statement.
OneCare will be sold on Microsoft's Web site and boxed versions will be available from retailers including Amazon.com Best Buy, Fry's Electronics, Sam's Club, Circuit City, OfficeMax, Costco, Staples, Wal-Mart Stores, Target, Office Depot, Comp USA and J&R Computer World, Microsoft said.
Businesses might be hard-pressed to buy security products from Microsoft, maker of the software that needs protection, industry analysts have said. On the consumer front, however, Microsoft brings a well-established and largely trusted brand into the market, these analysts have said.
Microsoft announced its intent to offer antivirus products in June 2003 when it bought Romanian antivirus software developer GeCad Software. Plans for OneCare were announced in May 2005. Invited testers have been trying it out since last July and a public test version was released late last year.
About 500,000 people have tested OneCare. Tens of thousands of those testers took advantage of Microsoft's April offer to buy the service at a discounted rate of US$19.95 per year, and selected testers have been offered the service for free as part of a "perpetual beta," Microsoft said.
Incumbents in the security space are preparing to respond to Microsoft's entry by integrating features into single products and moving to a subscription model for pricing. McAfee is working on a new product, code-named "Falcon," and Symantec has a project, dubbed "Genesis." Both are set to rival OneCare.
The global antivirus market is growing; it reached US$3.7 billion in revenue in 2004, up 36 percent from 2003, IDC said in December. The market research outfit forecasts the antivirus market will grow to US$7.3 billion in 2009.
With OneCare, Microsoft is targeting consumers, especially those who do not run security or have let their current product expire. The company says it believes 70 percent of consumers fall into that category. In a January research note, The Yankee Group estimated the niche as a market worth potentially US$15 billion.
OneCare is aimed at consumers. Microsoft is also eyeing the enterprise security market. It is working on a new Microsoft Client Protection product to defend business desktops, laptops and file servers against malicious code attacks. A public beta version of Client Protection is slated to be available in the third quarter of this year.
I am one of those 500,000 odd folks who had OneCare.Fact is,I was also fortunate enough to have gotten it as a tester the first day it hit in original Beta form.One of those offerred it for free when it was ready.For near to the entire time,it worked well along side my other programs/Apps,no conflicts.On one occasion,Microsoft deemed my copy as having a flaw in it and would have to delete it,download a fresh copy.On deleting and going for a new copy,the website tells me they refuse to download unless I delete my ZoneAlarm AND my Avast anti-virus first.NEVER SHOULD HAVE DELETED MY COPY.Talk about arrogance!!,neither Microsoft nor anyone else has the right to tell me or you,what we will or won't,have on our computers.Boy,that takes a big pair of (Golf)balls indeed.The other rotten thing about the entire program is the Backup.When a backup is done,even if there is only maybe 70 or 80 Mgs to a disc(CD-R or CD-RW)it WILL NOT add to the disc which holds some 700 to 800 Mgs of data.So,everytime you are literally forced to do a backup,a fresh new disc is required.If you don't DO the backup,then the program goes to a Yellow or RED mode and refuses to work properly.There is NO AV that can compete with Avast,NO firewall that can top ZoneAlarm and the day I don't have both,will be the day I no longer have a computer.If this is the route MS wants to take,by being arbitrary,then perhaps it's past time to be looking to all open source programming,operating systems.