Microsoft Moves Further Into the Cloud

Grazed from New York Times. Author: Quentin Hardy.

Microsoft just went further into the cloud. The Redmond, Wash., software giant announced Tuesday the new version of its computer server software. The product, called Windows Server 2012, is designed both to work independently and to connect with some 200 online services that Microsoft offers through its Azure cloud computing system. That is in addition to the usual upgrades in things like storage and networking capability.

While expected, this is a pretty big deal, and not just because the servers business is Microsoft’s second largest division in terms of revenue. (It brought in $18.7 billion in the fiscal year that ended last June 30.) It may be the most significant effort to date in Microsoft’s plan to change with the times…

“The world is changing from client-server to connected devices and continuous services,” Satya Nadella, president of Microsoft Server and Tools Business, said in an interview. “We want to be a primary provider of operating systems for people who want servers both to connect to the cloud, and to build their own cloud systems.”

That is tougher than it looks for a company like Microsoft because Office and the Windows OS, mostly delivered in personal computers and on conventional corporate servers, remain Microsoft’s cash cows. Server and Tools is second in revenues behind the Business division, which makes things like Microsoft Office and SharePoint. It is third in profits, however, behind both Business and the Windows and Windows Live division.

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