Microsoft 365 Partner Melbourne

Microsoft 365 is Microsoft's cloud-based productivity and security platform — it includes Exchange Online (business email), Teams (messaging, meetings, calls), SharePoint (intranet and file sharing), OneDrive (cloud storage), Microsoft 365 Apps (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook), and security tools including Defender for Office 365 and Intune device management. Business Premium adds enterprise-grade security and compliance. Microsoft 365 is also the prerequisite for Microsoft Copilot AI features.

A Microsoft 365 support plan from CX IT Services in Melbourne includes licence management as a Microsoft CSP (we provision directly — no markup), security baseline configuration, ongoing tenant management, helpdesk support for Microsoft 365 issues, and access to Microsoft Partner support channels for escalations. We manage Exchange Online, Teams, SharePoint, OneDrive, Intune, and Entra ID as a single managed service, not piecemeal.

Microsoft rebranded Office 365 to Microsoft 365 in 2020. Office 365 was primarily focused on the productivity apps (Word, Excel, Outlook). Microsoft 365 is the expanded platform that adds device management (Intune), advanced security (Defender), compliance tools (Purview), and AI features (Copilot). The Office 365 plans still exist in some forms but Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Standard, and Premium are now the standard tiers for most Melbourne businesses.

Microsoft 365 licensing through CX IT Services as a Microsoft CSP is provisioned at standard Microsoft pricing — there is no markup on the licence cost. Microsoft 365 Business Basic starts from around $7–8/user/month, Business Standard around $16–18, and Business Premium (the recommended tier for most Melbourne businesses, adding Intune and Defender) around $28–30/user/month. Our managed Microsoft 365 service — including ongoing management, security, and support — is from $200/user/month covering the full managed IT environment.

For most Melbourne professional services businesses — law firms, accounting practices, consulting firms — Microsoft 365 is the right choice. The Microsoft ecosystem (Teams, SharePoint, Outlook, Word, Excel) is the dominant standard in Australian professional services, and Microsoft 365 Business Premium's security toolset (Intune, Defender, Conditional Access) is significantly more mature than Google Workspace's equivalent. Businesses already invested in Microsoft tooling should stay there. Businesses on Google Workspace can migrate — we manage Google Workspace to Microsoft 365 migrations regularly.

Most businesses buy Microsoft 365 and use only 20% of its capabilities - email, maybe Teams, basic OneDrive. The platform includes world-class tools for security (Defender), device management (Intune), governance (Purview), and AI (Copilot). Proper configuration also dramatically improves your security posture. Most tenants we audit have serious security gaps.

Yes. We complete a tenant assessment, identify gaps, establish GDAP-compliant admin access, and take over ongoing management. For businesses with an existing CSP relationship, we manage the transition to our CSP agreement.

Microsoft 365 Copilot is an AI assistant integrated into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Teams. It can draft documents, summarise meetings, analyse data, and automate workflows. However, it requires proper data governance foundations - specifically sensitivity labels and SharePoint governance - before deployment. We assess readiness and manage the rollout correctly.

As a Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP), we provision licences at the same price as buying direct from Microsoft - there is no markup on the licence cost itself. The value of managing through us is that we optimise your licence mix, prevent over-provisioning, manage the billing, and provide the technical expertise to get full value from what you are paying for. Most Melbourne businesses we audit are either paying for licences they do not need or using the wrong SKU for their actual requirements.

A standard Microsoft 365 email migration for a 20-50 person Melbourne business takes 2-4 weeks from project kick-off to completion. This includes tenant configuration, security baseline setup, mailbox migration, DNS cutover, and staff onboarding. Larger or more complex migrations involving SharePoint, Teams governance, and legacy on-premise Exchange infrastructure take 4-8 weeks. We provide a detailed project plan with milestones before we start.

Microsoft 365 Business plans (Basic, Standard, Premium) are designed for organisations up to 300 users and cover most Melbourne SMB requirements. Business Premium includes Intune device management, Defender for Business, and Azure AD P1 - making it the recommended baseline for most growing Melbourne businesses. Enterprise plans (E3, E5) add advanced compliance, eDiscovery, advanced threat protection, and Microsoft Copilot eligibility. We recommend the right plan based on your security requirements, device management needs, and budget.

We implement a security baseline covering the fundamentals: multi-factor authentication for all accounts with no exceptions, conditional access policies that restrict sign-in to compliant devices and approved locations, Defender for Office 365 for email threat protection, and Privileged Identity Management (PIM) so admin accounts are not permanently elevated. We run regular Microsoft Secure Score reviews and implement improvements systematically. Most tenants we take over have significant security gaps - we typically find and close them within the first 30 days.

Your data is always yours. Microsoft provides tools to export email, contacts, calendars, SharePoint files, and Teams data in standard formats. We can manage a migration away from Microsoft 365 to any other platform if you ever require it - though in our experience, the Microsoft 365 ecosystem is the right choice for the vast majority of Melbourne businesses. We document your tenant configuration comprehensively so there is no knowledge trapped with any single provider.

Yes. Google Workspace to Microsoft 365 migrations are a common engagement for us. We migrate email, contacts, calendar, and Google Drive files to Microsoft 365 equivalents with minimal disruption. The migration process includes pre-migration data mapping, incremental sync, a scheduled cutover window, and a post-migration verification period. Staff receive training on Microsoft 365 applications as part of the project.

For managed Microsoft 365 clients, support requests go to our helpdesk and are handled by engineers who know your tenant configuration. We have direct Microsoft Partner support channels for complex issues that require escalation to Microsoft engineering - bypassing the standard consumer support queue. Issues like tenant-wide service outages, licence provisioning problems, and complex conditional access troubleshooting are handled through these partner channels on your behalf.