UPDATED 02:40 EDT / JULY 25 2016

NEWS

Microsoft to switch Windows Server team to its Windows & Devices Group

There’s a bit of an organizational reshuffle going on over at Microsoft, which has revealed it’s going to switch the engineering team responsible for Windows Server from its Cloud and Enterprise business unit to the Windows and Devices Group, which means that all versions of the Windows operating system are now under the same umbrella.

The reshuffle does not affect the leadership of either business group. That means Scott Guthrie retains his role as executive vice president of the Cloud and Enterprise unit, and Terry Myerson continues as executive vice president of the newly expanded Windows and Devices group, ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley, who first broke the story, reported.

However, the engineering teams responsible for both Windows Server and Microsoft’s Remote Desktop Services will now report to Myerson, as part of the Windows and Devices group. Not everyone from the team is moving though, as Mike Neil, who oversees engineering for Windows Server, will stay with the Cloud and Enterprise team. Also staying is Brad Anderson, who heads up Remote Desktop Services. Both officials will remain as part of the Cloud and Enterprise unit, heading up different engineering teams, Foley said.

“As we advance our goal to build operating systems that provide the best experiences from the smallest IoT devices to the largest scale server deployments in public and private clouds, the Windows Server team will move from the Cloud and Enterprise Group to the Windows and Devices Group,” Microsoft said in a statement to ZDNet. “These groups already work closely together, and we believe this move will help us bring even more value to our customers as we deliver our most cloud-ready server OS with the Windows Server 2016 launch this fall.”

Microsoft first created its Cloud and Enterprise group back in 2009 when it combined its Windows Server and Azure teams. At the time, Microsoft said it made sense to lump the two teams together as it meant its portfolio of public, private, and hybrid cloud offerings would be designed and developed under the same roof.

However, Foley says the thinking now is that it makes better sense to have Windows Server under the same roof as the other Windows teams, given the amount of cooperation that goes on between them. Since Windows 10, Microsoft has been pushing the idea of “one Windows” across multiple platforms, and that means development of the various versions of the OS is done almost in tandem with one another.

The next edition of Windows Server (2016) is set to launch this September, before being rolled out to customers in October. One of the most hyped new features in the OS will be the inclusion of Nano Server as a deployment option on both the Standard and Datacenter editions. Nano Server, for those who don’t already know, is the newly created, slimmed down, container-friendly version of Windows Server. Microsoft has also been talking up the “cloud-like” experience Windows Server 2016 will deliver, thanks to the incorporation of software-defined networking and storage.

Microsoft hasn’t said when the organizational reshuffle will actually happen, but ZDNet’s Foley suspects it will happen soon, well before Windows Server 2016 is released.

Image credit: efes via pixabay

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