So What About That Re-org?

[BajanSaint69]

I've been seeing a bunch of wailing and gnashing of teeth about the latest re-organization of Microsoft and the fact that "Windows has been demoted". This has kind of left me puzzled because I actually view the reorg as something very positive.

Before you dismiss it here's why.....

A couple of years back Microsoft published a couple of YouTube videos entitled "Future Visions" (you know the glossy high tech future) They were very interesting to look at in an abstract kind of way but at the time I really sort of viewed it like a science fiction movie. Then you stop to consider that Microsoft isn't an entertainment company and they must have had some reason for putting together these very slickly produced videos. These videos represent the future they are building for.

If you haven't seen them, I'd urge you to go and watch the videos, and then stop and think about what what would underpin that future from a computing systems standpoint. Intelligent cloud with intelligent edge systems doesn't sound like such boilerplate corporate speak any more. Neither does the concept of users experience living in the cloud and not being fixed to any device. In fact if you look at these videos you can see Surface Hub, Continuum, Touch, Fluent design all represented (ok well, maybe their great grandchildren) The other thing that's remarkable is what's not shown in these videos there isn't a Windows display anywhere!

There's a general trend with Microsoft (and others) towards a single OS that can pretty much run on almost every device type or be easily adapted to if something should arise that it cant run on. This is the vision behind Polaris/Andromeda. We also know that the idea of a desktop PC is pretty much a dead man walking (yes Apple is right with it's "What's a computer?" tag) Given that we know this, does it make sense focusing the company on what is essentially a device OS?

Nadella's big strategic gambit is for the fabric that ties the future together, in short it's to own the cloud. So yes Microsoft is going to attempt to be the on ramp for every device that is out there, be it Apple, Android, Chromebook, Linux or whatever. Windows and Surface are likely the most important of these on ramps to Microsoft but they aren't by any means the only one.

Viewed in this context, not only does this reorg make sense, but many of Microsoft's other moves suddenly fit into a wider tapestry that gives them particular meaning.

What a time to be alive.

 

[BajanSaint69]

Not coincidentally I've seen today a 5billion dollar investment in IOT. Yet another on ramp to the cloud.

 

[naddy6969]

Reorgs don't happen when things are going well. Reorgs are a reaction to things not going according to the current plan and are NOT going well. Period. Do you see Apple firing the person in charge of iOS? Google shaking up the Chrome department? Of course not.

Windows already has been demoted. Not by this reorg, but by the fact that Windows has gone from powering 94% of all personal computing devices sold 10 years ago (the rest was Mac and Linux), to 15% of all personal computing devices sold today (when you add up PCs, tablets and phones). That's a HUGE drop.

Even the share of Windows on desktop/laptop is dropping. Windows is actually losing share in a shrinking market. MacOS and Chrome are growing, Windows is declining. Not a good boat to be in.

Add in the fact that Microsoft has zero presence in the mobile and tablet markets, and it is time for a reorg.

Granted, this could turn out to be great. Sometimes reorgs work. But let's not kid ourselves about why this was necessary.

Planning for the future is always good. But the problem is, Microsoft has nothing for the present. When your mindshare is dropping daily, it becomes very difficult to convince others of your future vision.

 

[BajanSaint69]

Nadella has said in as many words that they missed the mobile boat. Bill Gates once said that MS was 3 years away from becoming irrelevant, which is what was going to happen if they kept doing the same thing that they were doing.

There's a lot of antipathy for Nadella on this forum, but to my mind he's the one who's been brave enough to call BS on the things that MS is doing that just aren't working. Calling time of death on the Mobile efforts was as necessary as it was painful. As much as we have people who miss Windows Mobile and cry long tears on here, there just aren't enough of us. MS was never going to be more than a bit player if it maintained that strategy. Another slab phone wasn't going to change things, the concept of Andromeda/Polaris where you can have a full computer in your pocket may work over the long haul, at least they won't be another "me too" phone.

Band never had a full strategy behind it, look at the release and the marketing it was a public beta at best. They've gone all in on games and seen good results, they have gone all in on putting their software on other OS's and they are seeing good results. They went all in on Surface and have seen good results. They are going all in on "One Windows".....If you evaluate each of those activities with respect to intelligent cloud and intelligent edge it's not difficult to see where they fit.

At least they are doing something to stop the rot. Windows was great 10 years ago, it's time to look to what's next.

 

[fatclue_98]

Reorgs don't happen when things are going well. Reorgs are a reaction to things not going according to the current plan and are NOT going well. Period. Do you see Apple firing the person in charge of iOS? Google shaking up the Chrome department? Of course not.

Windows already has been demoted. Not by this reorg, but by the fact that Windows has gone from powering 94% of all personal computing devices sold 10 years ago (the rest was Mac and Linux), to 15% of all personal computing devices sold today (when you add up PCs, tablets and phones). That's a HUGE drop.

Even the share of Windows on desktop/laptop is dropping. Windows is actually losing share in a shrinking market. MacOS and Chrome are growing, Windows is declining. Not a good boat to be in.

Add in the fact that Microsoft has zero presence in the mobile and tablet markets, and it is time for a reorg.

Granted, this could turn out to be great. Sometimes reorgs work. But let's not kid ourselves about why this was necessary.

Planning for the future is always good. But the problem is, Microsoft has nothing for the present. When your mindshare is dropping daily, it becomes very difficult to convince others of your future vision.

I couldn’t disagree more. Unlike Apple and Google, Microsoft is the services provider the others rely on so they have to stay ahead of the game. Apple doesn’t have any native services that others can use, all their products are proprietary and even Siri was reliant on Bing until very recently. Google doesn’t have a desktop OS to leverage other components, they’re mobile computing to the nth degree.

Mobile and tablets do not rule the computing world like some of our younger members seem to think. Without the goings on in the cloud and such, tablets and smartphones are expensive paperweights. Microsoft sees the coming shift and is getting ready for it. They have little use for a mobile program for the foreseeable future and while it sucks to be us, the market has spoken.

Companies like AT&T saw the end of landlines and faxes coming and overhauled their infrastructure to meet the future. I’m sure a few managers in the landline divisions got pink slips while up-and-coming mobility talent moved into their old offices. Microsoft is the infrastructure of computing and they’re doing exactly what is expected of a front-end organization.

 

[universalfield]

Microsoft didn't miss the mobile boat. They built it.

Everyone else in the game was simply along for the ride, but their children simply forgot.

As for the restructuring: I have a PC. Well, I have many, but let's keep it simple. I have a PC; a "Personal Computer". If half my stuff is on the cloud, that's not very personal. If it's full of sharing functions, that's not personal either.

What we're looking at is this:

I have a monitor, a keyboard, and a mouse. I will use those devices to interact with a remote computer and the data it houses. That's been done before. Indeed, it's been done a lot. Cloud computing is just another word for bringing back the late 1970's. The difference is, you don't own the mainframe. You're trusting someone else to maintain and secure it.

Microsoft is a very patient entity. They know what they are doing.

We're about to, for the first time in well over a decade, see what it's like to watch someone get the old fashioned MS "we told you so, and now we're going to show you how it's done" smack-down. It's been a while, and while I relish the chance to watch momma bear put the kids in time out again, I don't like what it means for personal computing.

We'll need a new term. It may as well be called "Social Computing" nowadays. We'll all be buying an SC instead of a PC. Regardless of how impressed I may be with their plans, I want no part of them. I don't like this stuff at all. If anyone can fix this mess, though, it's Microsoft.

Someone sure needs to.

 

[fatclue_98]

Microsoft didn't miss the mobile boat. They built it.

Cha-Ching! That's the sound you hear at Microsoft every time a new Android device is sold.

 

[BajanSaint69]

Microsoft is a very patient entity. They know what they are doing.

I agree, people on these forums look at one part of the picture and complain about one part of the picture without reference to the over all view. It's why I talked about the "Future Visions" videos. Also people tend to not hear things that they don't want to.

For example....

When they launched Windows 10 MS said that mobile was going to be de-emphasized until 2018.

They said so in as many words.

And yet, people are behaving as if MS was surprised by the current state of its mobile efforts, when what's happened is exactly what they said would happen. Clearly Polaris/Andromeda has been in the works for YEARS. Possibly from as far back as when Windows 8 was running (maybe before)

There is a broader strategy at work here and yes I do think that it has the potential to be a momma bear level smackdown. I'm watching how it is shaping up with great interest.

 

[universalfield]

Cha-Ching! That's the sound you hear at Microsoft every time a new Android device is sold.

Yup.

 

[fatclue_98]

Indeed it is. Every Android phone sold is proof of concept, and a free case study to see how well their little "pet project" is doing.

Windows mobile was always subsidized in developing markets by sales at higher prices elsewhere. It's predecessors ruled the world of business and commerce for ages, but as is their way, Microsoft knew that wouldn't last. Something else had to happen.

Enter bailing out the competition, and their seemingly nasty habit of not protecting their intellectual property. It's no accident that the iPhone has always packed design and technology originally fielded by Microsoft. Even that "Home" button they were so proud of had been done many times before, and in the same location.

The reason iPhone caught on so quickly is timing. For the first time, consumers, rather than professionals were about to purchase their first smart phones. One of the universal truths in regard to humans is the fact that they remember what they first used, and Microsoft knew these people wouldn't be overly familiar with electronic computing in general.

Best to wait a while, and let them settle on a rough style.

As such, the iPhone became popular, Apple came back from the dead (With Microsoft money and technology), and users simply cannot switch. That's what they learned, and that's all they know how to use. They can't use a PC, because the only one in the house is a $500 junker off a big-box shelf that they don't understand.

Microsoft knows this. Whatever their new project turns out to be, it's going to be a smash hit. For the past twenty years they've been working on a unified ecosystem that's actually powerful enough for enterprise use. You've seen it's beginnings sneak into various devices and software over the years.

Nothing Google or Apple has done in the memory of most these days is new. All of this stuff was predicted, demonstrated, and even fielded by Microsoft; sometimes decades earlier.

In the meantime, they let the tech slip; just enough. They've had that time to observe the market and adjust their plans. This is a business that thinks in terms of decades, rather than quarters.

While Apple and Google were happily peddling their products and services to consumers, Microsoft was fielding Windows Mobile to developing markets, and testing features in already developed markets. The first smart phone most people will use in many nations is a Windows Phone.

The second? A product that is at once a tablet, telephone, and cloud terminal; in whichever order they choose, in the end.

Here's the Microsoft business model, in the nutshell:

1: Develop some variety of new technology.

2: Prove that it works.

3: Negotiate the creation of an open standard. (Indeed, a lot of "open-source" software was initially a Microsoft project, and if not, largely funded by Microsoft.)

4: Sell what they have for a while, and arrange partnerships to move it into wide circulation.

5: Deliberately avoid defending their intellectual property as the standard expands throughout the industry.

6: Find a corner that hasn't been hit, and turn it into an auditorium.

7: Use the ideas, infrastructure, technology, and planning that's been built on what they gave away to field software to competing platforms.

8: Monetize the strategy in that manner.

9: Conduct required research.

10: Come out of nowhere with an offering that's compatible with the competition, and field it in the massive markets they've been quietly building the whole time.

11: Take back the industry.

They don't lose ground. They give it away strategically. Windows Mobile was the dying breath of Windows CE. They pushed it as far as possible to see what would happen. The bought hardware manufacturers, scored temporary partnerships, and spread it throughout the world.

Remember: Microsoft isn't concerned as much about mature markets as other companies. They build markets, let others develop them largely for free, and create the future while they wait. That's been the order of events throughout the history of the company.

They have the most solid track record for predicting future trends in the industry. It's just not a concept most take the time to understand.

If it weren't for Microsoft, you wouldn't be typing on this forum right now. The very event people misunderstand and seem to hate them for was created as a way to encourage adoption for the benefit of all.

The best part is, that also benefits Microsoft. They're really, REALLY good at that.

Amigo, I enjoy reading your posts. I appreciate thoughtful, well-written posts with impeccable grammar as I pride myself in doing the same. But please, easy on the verbiage. A lot of us are on mobile devices with itty bitty displays.

 

[universalfield]

Not quite the same now, is it?

It's an equally valid response, but the only thing to learn now is that I've replied. Now it's not so obvious that I saw the sarcasm and responded in more detail. People can still read your quote, however; so the deletion has not damaged the thread.

I would ask why so many browse forums and type equally extensively (if their word count across multiple forums and social media is combined) via smart phone, but I already know the answer.

In regard to readers, one might surmise that the device with which they viewed that post should have been a tablet, laptop, or desktop computing solution.

I wonder why it wasn't... Can you think of a place in which someone might routinely use a pocket-sized device for entertainment purposes from 9-5 on weekdays; once time zones are considered?

I can. :devil:

 

[fatclue_98]

I would go bats**t crazy if I were stuck in an office all day. Myself and those in my industry are on the go all day visiting jobsites, attending meetings, etc. so the luxury of a proper desktop is a fleeting one.

Sent from my HP Elite x3 on mTalk

 

[anon(10440410)]

I think Nadella is a weak CEO. As a chief/VP of Azure he would be great! But anyone who would appoint a **** like Belfiore over ANYTHING is a weak CEO. Anyone whoo would make Guthrie (a super nice but super boring super uninspiring guy) head over ANYTHING is a weak CEO.

Panay... that was a good call. But Belfiore? Guthrie? Ugh!

He's obviously searching for "yes men". People who will say anything for a paycheck. Anybody to agree with his fantasy that pcs, especially pc servers, are on the cusp of becoming sentient...

 

[anon(10440410)]

Reorgs don't happen when things are going well. Reorgs are a reaction to things not going according to the current plan and are NOT going well. Period. Do you see Apple firing the person in charge of iOS? Google shaking up the Chrome department? Of course not.

I hope you're wrong... but... I know you're right. Let's face it. Andromeda is NOT going to be released at Build. There's going to be a crap ton of buzzwords and hype about the "intelligent edge", "blockchain", "augmented reality", the "hybrid cloud", "internet of things"... blah blah blah di blah blah. But all just words... no action... certainly nothing an average Joe can understand let alone explain to his friends and family.

 

[anon(10440410)]

There's a lot of antipathy for Nadella on this forum, but to my mind he's the one who's been brave enough to call BS on the things that MS is doing that just aren't working. Calling time of death on the Mobile efforts was as necessary as it was painful.

You're just plain wrong. In fact you couldn't be more wrong. I've been in IT leadership long enough to know that managers are deeply insecure people who feel the urge to scrap everything and REBOOT it all about every 6 to 12 months. Only the really good ones rise above their "gut" feelings to see things through and to finish what was started.

Nadella is a shining example of what a leader should not be. His scrapping of everything Windows... and his crazy *** belief that Office 365 is on the cusp of becoming sentient is the epitome of bad management.

Not saying he wouldn't do great as a VP of Azure at MS, I think he shine there, but as CEO he is rather beggarly.

 

[will chris]

I've been seeing a bunch of wailing and gnashing of teeth about the latest re-organization of Microsoft and the fact that "Windows has been demoted". This has kind of left me puzzled because I actually view the reorg as something very positive.

Before you dismiss it here's why.....

A couple of years back Microsoft published a couple of YouTube videos entitled "Future Visions" (you know the glossy high tech future) They were very interesting to look at in an abstract kind of way but at the time I really sort of viewed it like a science fiction movie. Then you stop to consider that Microsoft isn't an entertainment company and they must have had some reason for putting together these very slickly produced videos. These videos represent the future they are building for.

If you haven't seen them, I'd urge you to go and watch the videos, and then stop and think about what what would underpin that future from a computing systems standpoint. Intelligent cloud with intelligent edge systems doesn't sound like such boilerplate corporate speak any more. Neither does the concept of users experience living in the cloud and not being fixed to any device. In fact if you look at these videos you can see Surface Hub, Continuum, Touch, Fluent design all represented (ok well, maybe their great grandchildren) The other thing that's remarkable is what's not shown in these videos there isn't a Windows display anywhere!

There's a general trend with Microsoft (and others) towards a single OS that can pretty much run on almost every device type or be easily adapted to if something should arise that it cant run on. This is the vision behind Polaris/Andromeda. We also know that the idea of a desktop PC is pretty much a dead man walking (yes Apple is right with it's "What's a computer?" tag) Given that we know this, does it make sense focusing the company on what is essentially a device OS?

Nadella's big strategic gambit is for the fabric that ties the future together, in short it's to own the cloud. So yes Microsoft is going to attempt to be the on ramp for every device that is out there, be it Apple, Android, Chromebook, Linux or whatever. Windows and Surface are likely the most important of these on ramps to Microsoft but they aren't by any means the only one.

Viewed in this context, not only does this reorg make sense, but many of Microsoft's other moves suddenly fit into a wider tapestry that gives them particular meaning.

What a time to be alive.

 

[anon(10406359)]

Regarding an above post about Windows losing market share and that being a bad boat to be in, it's a great boat for the users, because Microsoft can't get complacent with Windows. I hate the idea of any one OS dominating any hardware platform, because that doesn't foster innovation

 

[SvenJ]

So, what is Windows really? Is it the operating system that provides the framework for everything that comes in the box when you buy a Windows PC, or is it everything that comes in the box? Aren't file manager, wordpad, paint, solitaire, Edge/IE....just apps that run on the operating system? I think MS (and Apple, and Linux...) need to provide enough apps along with their OS to make the boxes they sell immediately usable, but the OS isn't all that sexy all by itself. It does need to be reliable and flexible. If you take operating systems in a computer science curriculum, you don't talk about calculator, word processors, games...you talk about the framework and the interface to hardware.

Maybe what we will get is concentration on making the OS itself great, reliable, secure, and if an app has problems, you fix the app, not patch the OS. Maybe what comes after Windows 10 is MS-OS. Don't know if the re-org will support that, but it does seem to divorce the functionality of the OS from the applications that are delivered with it, in a thing known as Windows.

 

[a5cent]

So, what is Windows really? [snipped] Aren't file manager, wordpad, paint, solitaire, Edge/IE....just apps that run on the operating system?

Absolutely. None of those things have anything to to with the OS. They are simply shipped in the same software bundle as the OS.

The actual OS doesn't have to be sexy, because the OS is not for consumers. The people who work with the OS are software and/or hardware developers. The OS' job is to help optimize developer's time to market, particularly for new and emerging IT trends, while also offering low-cost access to a large consumer base.

The consumer base is aquired or maintained by adding things to the OS (essentially any 1st or 3rd party software) which consumers do find sexy.

In regard to the latest reorg:

Some things are great, like organizing all of MS' sensing and perception technologies under one person (Kippman).

Placing OS development and the (consumer oriented and "sexier") front end stuff in separate divisions doesn't change nearly as much as most people here think it does. Those things have always been developed by completely different teams, even if they were in the same division. Far more important is how the funding and sizes of those individual teams change, but I don't think anyone knows anything about that. Until we do, judgement, as is quickly doled out here (positive or negative), seems premature to me.

I still think anything can happen, but until we see these reorganizations result in innovations that are meaningful to the general public, I find it hard to be certain of these steps taken by Nadella being anything, good or bad

 

[Gregorius Magnus]

"As much as we have people who miss Windows Mobile and cry long tears on here, there just aren't enough of us."

I think there are enough of us even in the subset of not being enough, that see clearly that killing off the mobile platform was not a bad idea because of there are no more handheld devices with a Microsoft logo on them. But because there is a loss in services ecosystem that they are building for anyways in Windows, and are simply getting the feedback on things from the wrong user-set, building things for the wrong devices. Simply a lot of things they are working on does not make sense on the current devices reached. And that is really bad. Cuz even if you have a low number of statistical data to work from is better when you have a large number of data being biased in may ways. But after all there must be a reason why Alcatel Idol and Wileyfox were revived recently.

They have all the right and reason to be insecure. Since they made bad decisions all along.

As per the reorg. Once you got yourself the Andromeda OS to which the GUI is just a simple component that runs only a selected devices which require such GUI, it makes no sense to keep Windows in the front row. Windows will simply become a GUI for Andromeda. Plain and simple. I would not be surprised if within 5 years MS would even change its logo to something that resembles Andromeda.

KR,
Gergely