Microsoft Sorts through Different Markets with New Initiatives
Software giant Microsoft is anything but limited to its core OS business, and is actively riding the current trends in enterprise IT and consumer tech to maintain the sizable market share it has built up across a number of industries. The company is preparing to launch Windows 8 sometime in the coming months, potentially as early as CES, and mobility has been among the key focuses of the project.
The fact that Windows 8 is touch-screen compatible and integrated with a number of seemingly related developments from big vendors, this led to both positive and negative speculations concerning the potential of Windows 8 as a tablet OS. Gavin Clarke rounded up some of the evidence, highlighting Microsoft’s plan to differentiate its offering in an already populated space by reaching out to the developer using a new platform.
“WinRT is a simple UI programming model for Windows devs that means they don’t need to learn Win32 – and which exposes the Windows Presentation Framework and Silverlight XAML UI model to developers. WinRT is designed to let you build apps which are self-contained, and can live in and be downloaded from an app store.”
Microsoft is entering the mobile scene with Windows 8, and is tapping data analytics to boost its web portal. The company is hoping to attract more users to MSN, the third largest web portal behind Yahoo and AOL, by analyzing data streamed via an extended partnership with Twitter and Facebook. This data then used to determine the topics highlighted on the homepage based on the most popular keywords and links.
As the company expands its consumer business, it’s also making strides on the enterprise front. In collaboration with Hitachi Consulting it will open up a new facility in Fargo, North Dakota in order to recruit the “highly productive and educated [local] people with a sense of community and Midwestern values”. Microsoft plucked out Hitachi’s proposal among several others, and there’s a probability the initial staff of 20 will be expanded in the future according to Hitachi exec Mike Gillis.
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