Dropbox Question 1 － Extended services vs Easy to use

First topic message reminder :

So far Dropbox offers a “simple, easy to use” service. Since there are more and more business customers, should Dropbox go beyond file sharing and syncing, thus offering a more sophisticated application for enterprises?

As Lee Ann just mentioned, Dropbox is currently offering a special product for enterprises: Dropbox for Teams. The basic offer is that for $795/year, a team of 5 persons receives 1TB of storage and phone support. Moreover, all file revisions are saved indefinitely by default ("unlimited version history"). It seems to respond quite well to customers' needs, at least if we refer to the posts on this forum. In my opinion, the idea is good in the sense that Dropbox stays quite close to its "core business" (file share and syncing) and can leverage its experience by extending its target customer segments.
However, this move also raises several issues. The success of Dropbox seems to be largely due to its "free" offering. Are businesses ready to pay $795 (or more) per year for Dropbox' solution? How can Dropbox compete on this new customer segment? I suppose its "brand name" and existing customer base are key assets for Dropbox, but I'm not sure that it will be sufficient...
All in all, I believe that Dropbox' move is quite interesting as it represents potentially a new source of cash, answers customers' needs, and relies on company's "knowledge capital". Moreover, if Dropbox for Teams is successful, it could be an opportunity for Dropbox to extend again its customer segments to big companies, by for example offering packages for thousands of employees (instead of just 5).

Edit: sorry for repeating what has been said, other answers explaining "Dropbox for teams" were given by the time I was writing

I think dropbox simplicity is its current key advantage but as we can see their current approach does not yield as much revenue as it could. Their current approach of offering different services for various customer segments is the right way I think since it enables them to approach different markets more efficiently. The current main issue in my opinion that the company is facing is that most casual customers do not think of dropbox as a potential service that they would pay for as the starting 2 gb are sufficient for most of their uses. Maybe an approach of charging these currently not paying customers would be applicable. For example external advertising could be used to generate revenue as e.g. some filesharing online platforms did in the past.

Keeping it simple is certainly the way forward, I think business like Dropbox because it offers them a simple way to share and synchronise files. As mentioned, Dropbox recently introduced "Dropbox for teams" which essentially add some extra features such as admin control, support, easy billing, extra security, etc. I think this is a smart approach as it adds usability for companies while maintaining the simple core offering.

LeeAnn wrote:Thanks Kai for your thoughts. So you think that the same service is suitable for SMEs and doesn't need changes (do I get you right?). Is it also suitable for larger players or are they not Dropbox customers?

Also, a new feature was launched a month ago called "Dropbox for Teams". Hint hint everybody

yeah, that's also what I've found,
and the price -- $795 annually for five users -- if I could say that is equal to $13.25/month for a user,
between the price of 50G ($9.99/month) and 100G($19.99/month),
so I think the price is quite reasonable, if I need those additional services and space, I will try the team package.

LeeAnn wrote:So far Dropbox offers a “simple, easy to use” service. Since there are more and more business customers, should Dropbox go beyond file sharing and syncing, thus offering a more sophisticated application for enterprises?

I think the more possibilities to build new revenue stream the better,
and they actually did launch "Dropbox for Teams" this November for business users, there are four features of it:
Work on the Go, Collaborate and Share, Easy Setup and Control, Trusted and Dependable.

"Sophisticated" doesn't mean "complex", I think Dropbox will and should hold the spirit of "simple, easy to use",
or they will losing their customers.

Thanks Kai for your thoughts. So you think that the same service is suitable for SMEs and doesn't need changes (do I get you right?). Is it also suitable for larger players or are they not Dropbox customers?

Also, a new feature was launched a month ago called "Dropbox for Teams". Hint hint everybody

I personally think that to extend the service for small enterprises is a very good approach. However, I don't think that dropbox has to offer a more sophisticated service just to address business customers. Especially the small and mid companies with low technological complexity don't really need a so-called high-class solution. Off course you have to guarantee a 99.5% stability and a 99.9% data safety. So this kind of settings might cause some additional investments for dropbox, but they can charge an additional fee for this additional service.

So far Dropbox offers a “simple, easy to use” service. Since there are more and more business customers, should Dropbox go beyond file sharing and syncing, thus offering a more sophisticated application for enterprises?