Reading Office 2007 files with Office 2003

If you receive Excel files from external sources (analyst reports, etc.), chances are that you will start encountering the Excel 2007 format. Those files will end in .xlsx, .xlsb or .xlsm instead of the current .xls

Office 2007 has a significant number of advantages, but some of us will be for a while stuck with Office 2003. My employer, for instance, will not upgrade anytime soon.

Microsoft recently made available an extension to read or write those files with our current version of Office. Once you install it, you can seamlessly open the file or save them as you would with a normal Excel file. Follow this link for the download page.