In an email dated Oct. 30 sent to top Microsoft executives and engineers, Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates said the “This coming ’services wave’ will be very disruptive” and they are now facing competitors who will seize on these approaches and challenge them. He was referring to the Web 2.0 that Microsoft is evidently being left behind the trend.
Dave Winer of scripting.com got his unnamed source to reveal the content of the memo, together with memo from Ray Ozzie, Microsoft CTO.
Here are the excerpts:
Microsoft has always had to anticipate changes in the software business and seize the opportunity to lead.
Ten years ago this December, I wrote a memo entitled The Internet Tidal Wave which described how the internet was going to forever change the landscape of computing. Our products could either prepare for the magnitude of what was to come or risk being swept away. We dedicated ourselves to innovating rapidly and lead the way much to the surprise of many industry pundits who questioned our ability to reinvent our approach of delivering software breakthroughs.
Five years ago we focused our strategy on .NET making a huge bet on XML and Web services. We were a leader in driving these standards and building them into our products and again this has been key to our success. Today, over 92% of the Fortune 100 are utilizing .Net and our current wave of products have XML and Web services at their core and are gaining share because of the bold bet we made back in the year 2000.
Today, the opportunity is to utilize the Internet to make software far more powerful by incorporating a services model which will simplify the work that IT departments and developers have to do while providing new capabilities.
Robert Scoble, the star MSFT blogger call them important memos, he longest he has read since becoming the employee of Microsoft, and “show clear understanding of how the world has changed.”
The full story is available here.
Scoble’s reaction here.
0 Responses to “Bill Gates’ memo to key Microsoft employees”