<p>Microsoft announced on Thursday that its next-generation Office solutions and other "2013"-branded products have reached the release-to-manufacturing (RTM) milestone.</p><p>The RTM status signifies that the solutions are complete and close to being available on the market for purchase. However, it's not just Office 2013 that is emerging fully baked from Redmond, Wash. Also at the RTM stage are Exchange 2013, Lync 2013, SharePoint 2013, Project 2013 and Visio 2013.</p><p>Kirk Koenigsbauer, corporate vice president of the Microsoft Office Division, announced the RTM milestone in a blog post. He claimed that the 2013-branded Office represents "the most ambitious release of Office we've ever done."</p><p>In July, Koenigsbauer and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer showed off touch-friendly Office 2013 apps. These apps will run on the "Desktop" side of the Windows 8 user interface. Microsoft is also building "Metro-style" Office apps, but so far only the OneNote Metro-style app is available for testing. Gartner analyst Steve Kleynhans has described the new Office 2013 apps as very similar to those in Office 2010, but with screen layouts optimized for touch. Kleynhans added that he didn't consider Office 2013 to represent a major user interface change, but those familiar with Office 2007 and Office 2010 will notice some differences.</p><p><a href="http://redmondmag.com/articles/2012/10/12/office-2013-rtm.aspx">Keep reading...</a></p><p>Read also:</p><p><a href="http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9232310/New_Microsoft_Office_hits_39_RTM_39_milestone">New Microsoft Office hits &#039;RTM&#039; milestone</a> (Computerworld)</p><p>Explore: <a href="http://news.google.com/news/more?ncl=dhcOYAwBSZ596jMqJo1AT86f_vd2M&ned=us">221 additional articles.</a></p>