Guest Blog: Microsoft Put a Foot on the Acceleration Pedal

Microsoft Put a Foot on the Acceleration Pedal

In the past, some people have accused Microsoft of being a bit pedestrian, and not shifting quickly enough with the times. This criticism can now take a back seat with a new focus from Ballmer and Co. to streamline their development as a company, and hasten the improvements to products and services they offer customers.

This new strategy has apparently been codenamed “Blue”, and consists of increasing the frequency of updates and improvements to services such as Office, Windows and Windows Phone OS. They no longer want to rest on their laurels, but continuously improve the experience of the user. Microsoft’s new focus is also in the evolution of their products as one entity, synchronising the stage of updates across devices and improving consistency throughout.

Their new vision includes some inspiring new directions, with the continued success of the Surface and the widely praised Surface Pro, which has sold over 400,000 units. The success of the new Office 365 is also a recent highlight for Microsoft. This adaptation to cloud computing and their foray into hardware has revealed Ballmer’s bold new strategy.

Small businesses change and adapt quickly, so this new vision sits perfectly with Microsoft’s mission to help small to medium enterprises improve themselves and develop in ways that will improve their efficiency and offer more to clients and customers. With the development of the useful SkyDrive and Microsoft’s merging of services like Skype and Yammer seamlessly into SharePoint, they’re aim is to offer an all-encompassing business solution across all products.

The rumoured merging of Windows and Windows Phone would also be a huge development for businesses and consumers and would offer an unprecedentedly uniformed experience across tablets, phones, and personal computers. The Windows Store has created a much needed one-stop-shop for Windows apps and has allowed Microsoft complete control over the nature and quality of the applications that run on their hardware devices - something that will help greatly in their aims to merge the Windows experience.

But key to all this is the increased urgency in offering frequent updates to products, continuously improving the experience of the user, and in doing so, challenging their major competitors’ services. In today’s fast-paced world, fluidity is essential. It seems that Microsoft are beginning to address this in their products.

Ballmer’s foot is firmly on the acceleration pedal, and Microsoft look like they are starting to gather some extra speed for businesses and consumers.

Author bio:

Marc Defosse is managing director of RibbonFish Ltd , a London-based IT consultancy specialising in Microsoft technologies. Marc enjoys blogging about the RibbonFish areas of interest such as CRM, SharePoint and web development, as well as the latest business IT & tech trends.

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Comments

• Anonymous
  April 21, 2013
  It is about time these changes happen and get introduced.

• Anonymous
  April 21, 2013
  Very great news and a challenging update to adopt to again.