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Most notably provides the Azure cloud computing platform, Microsoft SQL Server database software, and Visual Studio. Its flagship hardware products are the Surface lineup of PCs and the Xbox brand of video game consoles, the latter including the Xbox network. Its best-known software products are the Windows line of operating systems and the Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365 suite of productivity applications, which most notably include the Word word processor, Excel spreadsheet editor, and PowerPoint presentation program. Microsoft has been dominant in the IBM PC–compatible operating system and office software suite markets since the 1990s. A Big Tech company, Microsoft is the largest software company by revenue, one of the most valuable public companies, and one of the most valuable brands globally.
present: Acquisitions, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows 11
- This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks.
- Its best-known software products are the Windows line of operating systems and the Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365 suite of productivity applications, which most notably include the Word word processor, Excel spreadsheet editor, and PowerPoint presentation program.
- Subsequently, two employees, software engineers Ibtihal Aboussad and Vaniya Agrawal, interrupted AI executive Mustafa Suleyman at a speaking event on April 4, 2025, in protest at the company’s support of Israel.
- Criticism of Microsoft has followed various aspects of its products and business practices, including surveillance of employees, "Velvet Sweatshop" practices, tax manipulation, and antitrust violations.
- In October 2021, Microsoft announced that it began rolling out end-to-end encryption (E2EE) support for Microsoft Teams calls in order to secure business communication while using video conferencing software.
The UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office monitored the situation and noted the adjustments, which included enhanced security measures like encryption and biometric access. On July 19, a global IT outage impacted Microsoft services, affecting businesses, airlines, and financial institutions worldwide. Meanwhile, that month, the company announced a subscription offering of artificial intelligence for small businesses via Copilot Pro. However, the plan was short-lived, as Altman was subsequently reinstated as OpenAI’s CEO and Brockman rejoined the company amid pressure from OpenAI’s employees and investors on its board. The service includes Copilot, a GPT-4 based large language model tool to query and visualize data, write code, initiate simulations, and educate researchers.
2011: Microsoft Azure, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Microsoft Stores
Azure Services Platform, the company’s entry into the cloud computing market for Windows, launched on October 27, 2008. The European Union imposed another fine of €899 million ($1.4 billion) for Microsoft’s lack of compliance with the March 2004 judgment on February 27, 2008, saying that the company charged rivals unreasonable prices for key information about its workgroup and backoffice servers. Relatively strong sales of both products helped to produce a record profit in 2007.
This characterization is derived from the perception that Microsoft provides nearly everything for its employees in a convenient place, but in turn overworks them to a point where it would be bad for their (possibly long-term) health. The company is often referred to as a "Velvet Sweatshop", a term which originated in a 1989 Seattle Times article, and later became used to describe the company by some of Microsoft’s own employees. Historically, Microsoft has also been accused of overworking employees, in many cases, leading to burnout within just a few years of joining the company. The company has also been criticized for the use of permatemp employees (employees employed for years as "temporary", and therefore without medical benefits), the use of forced retention tactics, which means that employees would be sued if they tried to leave.
In December 2018, Microsoft announced Project Mu, an open source release of the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) core used in Microsoft Surface and Hyper-V products. In January 2018, Microsoft patched Windows 10 to account for CPU problems related https://caledonianoyster.co.uk/ to Intel’s Meltdown security breach. Intune for Education is a new cloud-based application and device management service for the education sector. To cope with the potential for an increase in demand for products and services, Microsoft opened a number of "holiday stores" across the U.S. to complement the increasing number of "bricks-and-mortar" Microsoft Stores that opened in 2012.
2014: Windows 8/8.1, Xbox One, Outlook.com, and Surface devices
The group, accessed "a very small percentage" of Microsoft corporate email accounts, which also included members of its senior leadership team and employees in its cybersecurity and legal teams. Amy Coleman, Microsoft’s executive vice president and chief people officer, said the layoffs were not the result of employees being replaced by AI, but acknowledged that AI is changing how work is done. Amid the layoffs, Microsoft also closed its office in Pakistan and laid off its employees there as part of its move toward a software-as-a-service and AI operating model. The public cloud computing platform provides access to quantum software and quantum hardware including trapped ion, neutral atom, and superconducting systems. Subsequently, two employees, software engineers Ibtihal Aboussad and Vaniya Agrawal, interrupted AI executive Mustafa Suleyman at a speaking event on April 4, 2025, in protest at the company’s support of Israel. The employees, part of the group No Azure for Apartheid, sought to address the company’s involvement in the Israeli government’s use of its technology.
The company became influential in the rise of personal computers through software like Windows and has since expanded into areas such as Internet services, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, video gaming, and more. This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks. On August 20, 20 Microsoft employees and their allies were arrested after refusing to disperse from a protest on Microsoft’s Redmond, Washington campus. After the disruptions at these events, Microsoft contacted the FBI in search of assistance in surveilling its pro-Palestinian employees and their allies.
Among grant recipients from the Asia-Pacific region are the Sri Lankan IT company Fortude, the Thailand-based Vulcan Coalition, and the Indonesian organization Kerjabilitas. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Microsoft’s president, Brad Smith, announced that it had donated an initial batch of supplies, including 15,000 protection goggles, infrared thermometers, medical caps, and protective suits, to healthcare workers in Seattle, with further aid to come. Dave Norris ran an internal joke campaign to save the old logo, which was green, in all uppercase, and featured a fanciful letter O, nicknamed the blibbet, but it was discarded. Baker stated "The new logo, in Helvetica italic typeface, has a slash between the o and s to emphasize the "soft" part of the name and convey motion and speed". Microsoft adopted the so-called "Pac-Man Logo", designed by Scott Baker, on February 26, 1987, with the concept being similar to InFocus Corporation logo that was adapted a year earlier in 1986.
1994: Windows and Office
Criticism of Microsoft has followed various aspects of its products and business practices, including surveillance of employees, "Velvet Sweatshop" practices, tax manipulation, and antitrust violations. On October 7, Microsoft acquired Ally.io, a software service that measures companies’ progress against OKRs, planning to incorporate it into its Viva family of employee experience products. In November 2024, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) launched an investigation into Microsoft, focusing on potential antitrust violations related to its cloud computing, AI, and cybersecurity businesses. Microsoft’s logo with the tagline "Your potential. Our passion."—below the main corporate name—is based on a slogan Microsoft used in 2008.
2011: Microsoft Azure, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Microsoft Stores
In August 2018, Microsoft implemented a policy for all companies providing subcontractors to require 12 weeks of paid parental leave to each employee. The Human Rights Campaign Corporate Equality Index, a report of how progressive the organization deems company policies towards LGBT employees, rated Microsoft as 87% from 2002 to 2004 and as 100% from 2005 to 2010 after it allowed gender expression. Bill Gates claims the cap on H1B visas makes it difficult to hire employees for the company, stating "I’d certainly get rid of the H1B cap" in 2005. Microsoft is an outspoken opponent of the cap on H-1B visas, which allows companies in the U.S. to employ certain foreign workers. Noted for its internal lexicon, the expression "eating your own dog food" is used to describe the policy of using pre-release and beta versions of products inside Microsoft to test them in "real-world" situations. Free technical support is traditionally provided through online Usenet newsgroups, and CompuServe in the past, monitored by Microsoft employees; there can be several newsgroups for a single product.
The initiative is meant to speed innovation through simple software changes in telecommunications networks, wireless networks, data centers, and other networking areas. This nonprofit organization is focused on providing support for a cloud computing initiative called Software-Defined Networking. Microsoft implemented a new strategy for the software industry, providing a consistent user experience across all smartphones using the Windows Phone OS.
