At a briefing in Redmond, Microsoft's Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner explains how business demands for advances in these four key areas guide Microsoft's strategy as it creates a software and services roadmaps.n As COO of Microsoft, Kevin Turner is responsible for the strategic and operational leadership of some 38,000 employees in Microsoft’s worldwide sales, marketing and services units. And along with Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer and five other top executives, Turner sits on the senior leadership team that charts Microsoft’s strategy. Related on CIO.com Why Microsoft Office Going Free Would Be Good For Business (And Users) SharePoint 2007 Demystified Microsoft Reveals Mesh Folder-Sharing and Sync Platform In a briefing at the company’s headquarters in Redmond, Wash., this week, Turner noted that there were four key enterprise trends shaping Microsoft’s strategic direction and future product offerings as well as how it will spend $7 billion in its R&D department. The first is businesses’ growing interest in virtualization. “It’s not a trend,” Turner says of virtualization, “but a theme.” And that theme relates to cost savings using virtualization tools, such as Microsoft’s Hyper V product. (See Microsoft Releases Beta of Hyper-V Virtualization Tools.) Though there are a couple of different areas where Microsoft is building out its nascent application and desktop virtualization offerings, server virtualization is where it’s focusing most of its efforts in a bid to unseat market leader VMware.The second important market trend is the rise of on-demand or software-as-a-service applications. Microsoft calls its new offerings in this area as “software plus services,” and Turner says that Microsoft’s move into this space is because customers are demanding it. (For more information, see Microsoft Buys into the Cloud and Microsoft Launches On-Demand CRM Software into a Crowded Market.)“People want choice,” Turner says. “We believe that most large customers will have a variety of business models that relate to software, and there are some bits of their information that they won’t want [someone else] to host or control.” For those that companies want a third-party to host, Microsoft or its partners are already or will soon be offering to host a multitude of Microsoft products and services (such as Office, Dynamics CRM, Exchange or SharePoint) on its servers.The third area is around unified communications, Turner says, and companies’ “mobility story,” which includes providing the ability to connect voice, data and video over communications devices, such as smartphones running the Windows Mobile platform and other telephony devices, and the computing desktop. (Also see: Seven Fantastic Free Windows Mobile Apps.)And fourth, Turner says that the “hottest area” in Microsoft is in the collaboration space and Microsoft’s SharePoint server product, which offers companies the ability manage their documents, records and other content, search that content and provide other workflow and collaboration opportunities. (For more, see SharePoint 2007 Demystified and Microsoft Reveals Mesh Folder-Sharing and Sync Platform.)Taken together, these four market trends are where Microsoft will be releasing new products and solutions that will “really help [customers] solve their problems,” which, he says, is exactly what they are looking for from Microsoft right now. Related content brandpost Sponsored by Freshworks When your AI chatbots mess up AI ‘hallucinations’ present significant business risks, but new types of guardrails can keep them from doing serious damage By Paul Gillin Dec 08, 2023 4 mins Generative AI brandpost Sponsored by Dell New research: How IT leaders drive business benefits by accelerating device refresh strategies Security leaders have particular concerns that older devices are more vulnerable to increasingly sophisticated cyber attacks. By Laura McEwan Dec 08, 2023 3 mins Infrastructure Management case study Toyota transforms IT service desk with gen AI To help promote insourcing and quality control, Toyota Motor North America is leveraging generative AI for HR and IT service desk requests. By Thor Olavsrud Dec 08, 2023 7 mins Employee Experience Generative AI ICT Partners feature CSM certification: Costs, requirements, and all you need to know The Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) certification sets the standard for establishing Scrum theory, developing practical applications and rules, and leading teams and stakeholders through the development process. By Moira Alexander Dec 08, 2023 8 mins Certifications IT Skills Project Management Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe