Microsoft's new strategy, a mobile-first, cloud-first world.

[anyweb]

Microsoft is pushing forward with it's plans to gain presence and dominate in the mobile and cloud space with the following email from Satya Nadel which makes clear that the new mission statement is all about a mobile-first, cloud-first world with flagship products like Office 365 (for viewing and producing content) and Onedrive (for storing your content) being key components of that evolving landscape.

 

 

After 22 years at Microsoft, Satya has commented that at the end of all exploring you arrive where you started and that Microsoft's customers want to know where the company is going, and the company is going mobile-first and cloud-first. With that some top leaders have left the company and others (Scott Guthrie, Phil Spencer and Stephen Elop once the Nokia deal goes through) have been promoted to top spots, this is a good thing as leadership change will hopefully refresh what we expect from Microsoft. As proof of the changing times, In the webcast we got a demo of Office 365 for the iPad, which is a great step forward for anyone who has tried to read Word documents on their iPad.

 

 

In addition we get to see the unique touch features added to Powerpoint that you can use for the iPad such as highlighting or laser pointer, anyone with an iPad can download Office 365 for free and read and present content. If they want to edit or create content then they'll need to subscribe to Office 365.

 

 

"Office 365 subscribers have the full experience on all their devices"

 

That's the promise from Microsoft. And quite a statement it is too.

 

Hopefully with that comment we will see similar releases for Android and other platforms or did they just mean iOS and Windows 8.x devices ? that remains to be seen. Windows Intune was mentioned as the Mobile Device Management platform along with a demo of the company portal for Android but noticeably missing was Office 365 for Android. This is a new area for Microsoft and I hope they take the bull by the horns and continue to deliver an Office suite that covers all major players and not just versions for iOS and Windows. With Android share increasing (and iOS share decreasing) what we also need to see from Microsoft is Office 365 for Android. That step would certaintly confirm Satya's vision above and cement Microsoft's place as a key player in the mobile and cloud space.

 

You can see the entire webcast covering the above and more here

 

cheers

niall