microsoft.com

Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational computer technology corporation, which rose to dominate the home computer operating system market with MS-DOS in the mid-1980s, followed by the Windows line of operating systems.

Throughout its history the company has been the target of criticism for various reasons, including monopoly status and anti-competitive business practices including refusal to deal and tying. The U.S. Justice Department and the European Commission, among others, have ruled against Microsoft for various antitrust violations.

It develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of software products for computing devices. Microsoft's best-selling products are the Microsoft Windows operating system and the Microsoft Office suite of productivity software.

Microsoft Corporation
Type	Public (NASDAQ: MSFT)
Founded	Albuquerque, New Mexico (April 4, 1975 (1975-04-04))
Founder	Bill Gates Paul Allen
Headquarters	Redmond, Washington
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Bill Gates (Chairman) Steve Ballmer (CEO) Ray Ozzie (CSA) Craig Mundie (CRSO)
Industry	Computer software Publishing Research and development Computer hardware Video games
Products	Microsoft Windows Microsoft Office Microsoft Servers Developer Tools Microsoft Expression Business Solutions Games & Xbox 360 Windows Live Windows Mobile Zune
Market cap	US$ 259.75 Billion (2007)
Revenue	▲ US$ 60.420 Billion (2008)
Operating income	▲ US$ 22.492 Billion (2008)
Net income	▲ US$ 17.681 Billion (2008)
Total assets	▲ US$ 72.793 Billion (2008)
Total equity	▲ US$ 36.286 Billion (2008)
Employees	89,809 in 105 countries (2008)
Website	microsoft.com

Employment

Microsoft interview candidates report the interview process includes a phone and 1:1 interview with a background check and skills test.  Canidates indicated a "Difficult" interview rating (3.5 out of 5) with over 70% having a "Positive" interview experience.

As a multi-national computer technology corporation employing over 80,000, Microsoft has numerous technology positions in the United States and around the world.  Most are full-time, salaried employees plus a cash or equity bonus structure, depending upon the position.  Below are Microsoft salary details for common Microsoft jobs:

• Microsoft Software Development Engineer salary - $90,825 (Average, USD)
• Microsoft Program Manager salary - $90,563 (Average, USD)
• Microsoft Systems Engineer salary - $95,336 (Average, USD)
• Microsoft Product Manager salary - $99,204 (Average, USD)
• Microsoft Marketing Director salary - $154,286 (Average, USD)
  

History

The company released an initial public offering (IPO) in the stock market, which, due to the ensuing rise of the stock price, has made four billionaires and an estimated 12,000 millionaires from Microsoft employees.

Main article: History of Microsoft

See also: History of Microsoft Windows

1975–1985: Founding

Following the launch of the Altair 8800, William Henry Gates III, (called Bill Gates) called the creators of the new microcomputer, Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), offering to demonstrate an implementation of the BASIC programming language for the system. After the demonstration, MITS agreed to distribute Altair BASIC.Gates left Harvard University, moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico where MITS was located, and founded Microsoft there. The company's first international office was founded on November 1, 1978, in Japan, entitled "ASCII Microsoft" (now called "Microsoft Japan"). On January 1, 1979, the company moved from Albuquerque to a new home in Bellevue, Washington. Steve Ballmer joined the company on June 11, 1980, and later succeeded Bill Gates as CEO.

DOS (Disk Operating System) was the operating system that brought the company its first real success. On August 12, 1981, after negotiations with Digital Research failed, IBM awarded a contract to Microsoft to provide a version of the CP/M operating system, which was set to be used in the upcoming IBM Personal Computer (PC). For this deal, Microsoft purchased a CP/M clone called 86-DOS from Seattle Computer Products, which IBM renamed to PC-DOS. Later, the market saw a flood of IBM PC clones after Columbia Data Products successfully cloned the IBM BIOS, and by aggressively marketing MS-DOS to manufacturers of IBM-PC clones, Microsoft rose from a small player to one of the major software vendors in the home computer industry.The company expanded into new markets with the release of the Microsoft Mouse in 1983, as well as a publishing division named Microsoft Press.

1985–1995: IPO, OS/2 and Windows

In August 1985, Microsoft and IBM partnered in the development of a different operating system called OS/2. On November 20, 1985, Microsoft released its first retail version of Microsoft Windows, originally a graphical extension for its MS-DOS operating system. On March 13, 1986 the company went public with an IPO, with a starting initial offering price of $21.00 and ending at the first day of trading as at US $28.00. In 1987, Microsoft eventually released their first version of OS/2 to OEMs.

IPO

Microsoft's Initial Public Offering took place on March 14, 1986 (or it was the first trading day). The stock, which eventually closed at $27.75 a share, peaked at $29.25 a share shortly after the opening. Microsoft's two founders - Bill Gates and Paul Allen - were made instant millionaires by the offering, but they didn't seem fazed by all the hoopla. Allen went to work as usual at Asymetrix, the company he founded the year before in Bellevue. Gates was in Australia on business. At that time, Bill Gates owned 45 percent of the company's 24.7 million outstanding shares and Paul Allen owned roughly 25 percent of the shares. Gates' Microsoft stake was $233.9 million at the time of Microsoft's 1986 IPO, ^[making Microsoft's total-value worth $519,777,778 at that time (1986).

Post-IPO

 

The sign at a main entrance to the Microsoft corporate campus. The Redmond Microsoft campus today includes more than 8 million square feet (approx. 750,000 m²) and over 30,000 employees.

In 1989, Microsoft introduced its flagship office suite, Microsoft Office. This was a bundle of separate office productivity applications, such as Microsoft Word and Microsoft Excel. On May 22, 1990 Microsoft launched Windows 3.0. The new version of Microsoft's operating system boasted such new features as streamlined user interface graphics and improved protected mode capability for the Intel 386 processor; it sold over 100,000 copies in two weeks.Windows at the time generated more revenue for Microsoft than OS/2, and the company decided to move more resources from OS/2 to Windows. In the ensuing years, the popularity of OS/2 declined, and Windows quickly became the favored PC platform.

During the transition from MS-DOS to Windows, the success of Microsoft's product Microsoft Office allowed the company to gain ground on application-software competitors, such as WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3. According to The Register, Novell, an owner of WordPerfect for a time, alleged that Microsoft used its inside knowledge of the DOS and Windows kernels and of undocumented Application Programming Interface features to make Office perform better than its competitors. Eventually, Microsoft Office became the dominant business suite, with a market share far exceeding that of its competitors.

In 1993, Microsoft released Windows NT 3.1, a business operating system with the Windows 3.1 user interface but an entirely different kernel. In 1995, Microsoft released Windows 95, a new version of the company's flagship operating system which featured a completely new user interface, including a novel start button; more than a million copies of Microsoft Windows 95 were sold in the first four days after its release. The company also released its web browser, Internet Explorer, with the Windows 95 Plus! Pack in August 1995 and subsequent Windows versions.

1995–2005: Internet and legal issues

On, May 26, 1995, following Bill Gates's internal "Internet Tidal Wave memo", Microsoft began to expand its product line into computer networking and the World Wide Web. On August 24, 1995, it launched a major online service, MSN (Microsoft Network), as a direct competitor to AOL. MSN became an umbrella service for Microsoft's online services. The company continued to branch out into new markets in 1996, starting with a joint venture with NBC to create a new 24/7 cable news station, MSNBC. Microsoft entered the personal digital assistant (PDA) market in November with Windows CE 1.0, a new built-from-scratch version of their flagship operating system, specifically designed to run on low-memory, low-performance machines, such as handhelds and other small computers. Later in 1997, Internet Explorer 4.0 was released for both Mac OS and Windows, marking the beginning of the takeover of the browser market from rival Netscape. In October, the Justice Department filed a motion in the Federal District Court in which they stated that Microsoft had violated an agreement signed in 1994, and asked the court to stop the bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows.

The year 1998 was significant in Microsoft's history, with Bill Gates appointing Steve Ballmer as president of Microsoft but remaining as Chair and CEO himself. The company released Windows 98, an update to Windows 95 that incorporated a number of Internet-focused features and support for new types of devices. On April 3, 2000, a judgment was handed down in the case of United States v. Microsoft, calling the company an "abusive monopoly" and forcing the company to split into two separate units. Part of this ruling was later overturned by a federal appeals court, and eventually settled with the U.S. Department of Justice in 2001.

In 2001, Microsoft released Windows XP, the first version that encompassed the features of both its business and home product lines. Before XP was released, Microsoft had to maintain both the NT and the 9x codebase. XP introduced a new graphical user interface, the first such change since Windows 95. Later, with the release of the Xbox Microsoft entered the multi-billion-dollar game console market dominated by Sony and Nintendo. Microsoft encountered turmoil in March 2004 when antitrust legal action was brought against it by the European Union for abusing its current dominance with the Windows operating system (see European Union Microsoft antitrust case), eventually resulting in a judgment to produce new versions of its Windows XP platform—called Windows XP Home Edition N and Windows XP Professional N—that did not include its Windows Media Player, as well as a fine of €497 million ($613 million).

2006–present: Vista and other transitions

On June 27, 2008, Bill Gates retired from day-to day activities in the company, following a two year transition period from his role as Chief Software Architect, which was taken by Ray Ozzie, but remained the company's chairman, head of the Board of Directors and would act as an adviser on key projects. Windows Vista, released in January 2007, is Microsoft's latest operating system and has sold 140 million copies to date. Microsoft Office 2007, released at the same time, features a "Ribbon" user interface which is a significant departure from its predecessors. Relatively strong sales of both titles helped to produce a record profit in 2007.

On February 1, 2008, Microsoft made an unsolicited bid to purchase internet services competitor Yahoo! for up to $44.6 billion, though this offer was rejected on February 10. On May 3, 2008, Microsoft withdrew their offer.

Microsoft announced on February 21, 2008 that it will share more information about its products and technology in order to make it easier for developers to create software that works with its products. However, the European Union continued to demonstrate its dissatisfaction with the company for its lack of compliance with the March 2004 judgment and subsequently, on February 27, 2008 imposed an additional fine of €899 million ($1.4 billion), the largest fine in the history of EU competition policy.

On June 26, 2008, Microsoft announced it would buy Mobicomp, a Portuguese company operating in cell phone software. In its 2008 Annual Report Microsoft stated that open source software business models challenge its license-based software model and that the firms who use this business models do not bear cost for their software development.

Product divisions

To be more precise in tracking performance of each unit and delegating responsibility, Microsoft reorganized into seven core business groups—each an independent financial entity—in April 2002. Later, on September 20, 2005, Microsoft announced a rationalization of its original seven business groups into the three core divisions that exist today: the Windows Client, MSN and Server and Tool groups were merged into the Microsoft Platform Products and Services Division; the Information Worker and Microsoft Business Solutions groups were merged into the Microsoft Business Division; and the Mobile and Embedded Devices and Home and Entertainment groups were merged into the Microsoft Entertainment and Devices Division.

Platform Products and Services Division

 

The current logo of Microsoft Windows, one of the company's best-known products.

This division produces Microsoft's flagship product, the Windows operating system. It has been produced in many versions, including Windows 3.1, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows Me, Windows Server 2003, Windows XP and Windows Vista. Almost all IBM compatible personal computers come with Windows preinstalled. The current desktop version of Windows is Windows Vista. The online service MSN, the cable television station MSNBC and the Microsoft online magazine Slate are all part of this division. (Slate was acquired by The Washington Post on December 21, 2004.) At the end of 1997, Microsoft acquired Hotmail, the most popular webmail service, which it rebranded as "MSN Hotmail". In 1999, Microsoft introduced MSN Messenger, an instant messaging client, to compete with the popular AOL Instant Messenger. Along with Windows Vista, MSN Messenger became Windows Live Messenger.

Microsoft Visual Studio is the company's set of programming tools and compilers. The software product is GUI-oriented and links easily with the Windows APIs, but must be specially configured if used with non-Microsoft libraries. The current version is Visual Studio 2008. The previous version, Visual Studio 2005 was a major improvement over its predecessor, Visual Studio.Net 2003, named after the .NET initiative, a Microsoft marketing initiative covering a number of technologies. Microsoft's definition of .NET continues to evolve. As of 2004, .NET aims to ease the development of Microsoft Windows-based applications that use the Internet, by deploying a new Microsoft communications system, Indigo (now renamed Windows Communication Foundation). This is intended to address some issues previously introduced by Microsoft's DLL design, which made it difficult, even impossible in some situations, to manage, install multiple versions of complex software packages on the same system (see DLL-hell), and provide a more consistent development platform for all Windows applications (see Common Language Infrastructure). In addition, the Company established a set of certification programs to recognize individuals who have expertise in its software and solutions. Similar to offerings from Cisco, Sun Microsystems, Novell, IBM, and Oracle Corporation, these tests are designed to identify a minimal set of proficiencies in a specific role; this includes developers ("Microsoft Certified Solution Developer"), system/network analysts ("Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer"), trainers ("Microsoft Certified Trainers") and administrators ("Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator" and "Microsoft Certified Database Administrator").

Microsoft offers a suite of server software, entitled Windows Server System. Windows Server 2003, an operating system for network servers, is the core of the Windows Server System line. Another server product, Systems Management Server, is a collection of tools providing remote-control abilities, patch management, software distribution and a hardware/software inventory. Other server products include:

• Microsoft SQL Server, a relational database management system;
• Microsoft Exchange Server, for certain business-oriented e-mail and scheduling features;
• Small Business Server, for messaging and other small business-oriented features; and
• Microsoft BizTalk Server, for business process management.

Business Division

 

Front entrance to building 17 on the main campus of the company's Redmond campus.

The Microsoft Business Division produces Microsoft Office, which is the company's line of office software. The software product includes Word (a word processor), Access (a personal relational database application), Excel (a spreadsheet program), Outlook (Windows-only groupware, frequently used with Exchange Server), PowerPoint (presentation software), and Publisher (desktop publishing software). A number of other products were added later with the release of Office 2003 including Visio, Project, MapPoint, InfoPath and OneNote.

The division focuses on developing financial and business management software for companies. These products include products formerly produced by the Business Solutions Group, which was created in April 2001 with the acquisition of Great Plains. Subsequently, Navision was acquired to provide a similar entry into the European market, resulting in the planned release of Microsoft Dynamics NAV in 2006. The group markets Axapta and Solomon, catering to similar markets, which is scheduled to be combined with the Navision and Great Plains lines into a common platform called Microsoft Dynamics.

Logos and slogans

In 1987, Microsoft adopted its current logo, the so-called "Pacman Logo" designed by Scott Baker. According to the March 1987 Computer Reseller News Magazine, "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." Dave Norris, a Microsoft employee, 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.

Microsoft's logo with the "Your potential. Our passion." tagline below the main corporate name, is based on the slogan Microsoft had as of 2008. In 2002, the company started using the logo in the United States and eventually started a TV campaign with the slogan, changed from the previous tagline of "Where do you want to go today?."

Microsoft "blibbet" logo, used until 1987.

Microsoft "Pac-Man" logo, designed by Scott Baker and used since 1987, with the 1994–2002 slogan "Where do you want to go today?"

Microsoft logo as of 2008, with the current slogan "Your potential. Our passion."