Microsoft betting on bright blue – Azure – sky, er cloud
Posted by Jacque on October 28th, 2008
Introducing a service designed to make it simple for developers to create programs that run on remote servers accessed by users through Web browsers, cell phones or PDAs, Microsoft named “Windows Azure” as a key shift for the company from desktop-based products to online services. The announcement was made at the 2008 Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles.
With Azure, they have “jumped into a new era in which programs such as e-mail and word processing are increasingly accessed online,” states a Seattle P-I article. We have seen a lot about “cloud” computing recently, especially from top competitor Amazon, about which Ray Ozzie, Microsoft’s chief software architect said, “I’d like to tip my hat to (Amazon CEO) Jeff Bezos and Amazon.”
Azure is Microsoft’s shift to a “software plus services” strategy, which will entail online — or “services” — components in all of its offerings. The company sees several advantages for itself: a large group of developers familiar with Microsoft’s tools and a huge data storage capacity.
“There are many applications that people would like to build,” Robert Muglia, Microsoft’s senior vice president, said. With Azure, the applications will be hosted in Microsoft’s own vast data centers.
eWeek’s Microsoft Watch also has the story.
