Cyanogen to ship Microsoft apps with Cyanogen OS

Cyanogen will ship Microsoft apps and services in Cyanogen OS. Both companies have entered into an agreement for this. For example, Cyanogen OS includes Office, Outlook and OneNote. That will happen later this year.

Both companies will announce the collaboration on Thursday afternoon. These are Bing services, Skype, OneDrive, OneNote, Outlook and Microsoft Office. The companies have not disclosed the amount involved in the partnership. The announcement stands out because Cyanogen put a Microsoft logo in the bootscreen at nightly’s as a 1 April joke a few weeks ago. Before that, there were already many rumors about an investment by Microsoft in Cyanogen.

Microsoft is working on getting its apps preinstalled on more devices. The Samsung Galaxy S6 and new Sony Xperia devices include Microsoft apps in the standard firmware. The Redmond-based company probably wants to use these steps to persuade more users to use Microsoft services, even if their phone does not run on Microsoft’s own Windows Phone.

Update, 15:12: This article originally mentioned CyanogenMod, but the companies only report the use of Microsoft apps in Cyanogen OS. That is the operating system such as Cyanogen that comes standard on devices such as the OnePlus One.

Two weeks ago an April 1 joke, now partly reality: Cyanogen to deliver Microsoft apps