Further intensifying the enterprise wars, Dropbox has today announced the launch of its note-taking app ‘Paper’ globally. This tool has been available under public beta for almost six months and is now finally surfacing as another collaborative app for managing the workflow. This app also aims to now provide users with greater project management capabilities, by localizing content in 21 languages.
Cloud storage provider Dropbox has been working on its note-taking platform Paper for quite some time now. The company first showed us the platform back in 2015, which officially entered public beta with some add-on features in August last year. And now, it is finally available for use to everyone using the service. There have been numerous feature additions and fixes since its debut.
Dropbox Paper has mostly been described by techies as a counterpart to Google Docs. This tool enables teams to plug in and collaborate on projects simultaneously. The said tool itself is a minimal text editor similar to Docs, which is connected to all other services that connect to Dropbox. This is extremely beneficial for enterprise users who’re looking for a single window management tool on the cloud, accessible via a browser.
Speaking about the user experience, Kavitha Radhakrishnan, Group Product Manager at Dropbox said,
The thing that Dropbox Paper does well is that it really supports modern workflows really well. We re-imagined the experience from the bottom up. We wanted to make sure it works not just from creation to views, but beyond that. We want it to support all phases of the creative process.
As for the features of the said enterprise tool, Paper includes a shared space called Projects that enables teams to organize content and stay better informed about their progress. This view is currently being made available to select teams, with global expansion in coming weeks. It also provides users with simplistic drag and drop tools to add images or create image galleries. Adding embed links from YouTube, Vimeo or Dropbox is also a touch away. It also packs in markdown support for advanced writers.
But what’s even more impressive is the fact that Dropbox has baked in a presentation mode directly into their note taking app. It enables the user to seamlessly generate presentations and edit them through Paper in their browsers. This eases the task of copying and pasting content from the word document into a new presentation. We now also have the ability to add due dates and assign owners to tasks in a team effort.
Talking about the aforementioned launch, Drew Houston, co-founder and CEO of Dropbox, says,
We’re redesigning Dropbox to be fundamentally designed for teams. We’re reinventing sync, bringing a modern collaboration experience to all your files, and launching Paper, a new way to work together that goes beyond the document. And we’re building this all on top of a strong business foundation—we’ve reached $1 billion in revenue run rate faster than any other SaaS company in history.
Though Dropbox is late to the enterprise collaboration party, which is currently being dominated by prominent players like Microsoft and Salesforce but it plans to carve a way out. The company is banking on their simplistic approach to court teams away from Google and other enterprise productivity suites. We’ll have to wait to witness if Paper is substantial enough to fend off competition and achieve success. For those interested in checking out the app, click here to take a route to productivity.