Microsoft is launching a new app development platform today that is designed to help business and enterprise users create custom apps that stores their content inside a current Microsoft 365 tenant. It's called SharePoint Embedded, and it's available in public preview today. Microsoft revealed it as part of its presentation at the ESPC (European SharePoint Conference) event in Amsterdam today.
In a blog post, Microsoft stated:
Enterprises can use SharePoint Embedded to power line of business apps, creating a unified and familiar experience for both app users and system administrators charged with managing these new apps. ISVs can use this same scalable and performant technology to deliver Microsoft 365 content management capabilities as part of every enterprise app they build. When an ISV adopts SharePoint Embedded, documents are managed within the end customer’s tenant. The ISV’s customers can leverage a robust and consistent content management system they already trust, including global security and compliance.
Microsoft has already been using SharePoint Embedded to power two of its newer apps. One is Microsoft Loop, the collaboration service that just became generally available. The other is Microsoft Designer, the AI-based graphics tool that entered its public preview stage earlier this year.
Microsoft says enterprise users can use SharePoint Embedded to make apps that support a number of the company's products and services. That includes features like co-authoring in Word or PowerPoint, the use of safety features like Microsoft 365 Backup and Microsoft 365 Archive, and adding a company's content to the Microsoft 365 semantic index that's now used in Copilot for Microsoft 365.
Microsoft currently plans to make SharePoint Embedded generally available for all Microsoft 365 enterprise customers sometime in mid-2024. The company will charge businesses based on the storage they will use, along with their volume of API calls and data transfers. Businesses won't have to pay for any additional Microsoft 365 user licenses.
