It’s one year since Microsoft appointed*Satya Nadella*as its third CEO. He was clearly the right person for the job.Things are not perfect at Microsoft, but Nadella has done a great job of reinventing the company and making it relevant again.
Some of his achievements:

  • Made Microsoft a player in the booming iOS with first class versions of key Office apps.
  • The Office apps were in the pipeline, but stalled, when Nadella took over. However, it was under his leadership Microsoft acquired Accompli then raced to get a terrific version of Outlook for iOS out to market.
  • For a long time Microsoft was openly hostile to Apple. Former CEO Steve Ballmer spoke contemptuously*of iPhones and iPads. Nadella stopped the cold war, even choosing to use Apple kit to display Microsoft products to audiences. He has a clear understanding of symbolism.
  • Likewise Microsoft has built bridges to the Android world. There are Android apps and new Microsoft tools for building apps on Windows, Apple or Android devices.
  • Microsoft is investing in*Cyanogen to build a new, non-Google, fork of Android.
  • There have been a swag of new products including Sway and Delve. Also the Skype translator.
  • Revitalised Windows which badly lost direction and momentum under Ballmer with Windows 8. Windows 10 looks to change that. Apart from anything else, it’s one*OS, one code base, that will run on any device from tiny to huge.
  • *Made Windows*free*for devices with screens smaller than nine inches. That’s going to change the dynamics of the market for low-end tablets and small computers.

Underlying this is a new confidence in Microsoft from investors. The company is worth 20 percent more today than when Steve Ballmer announced his departure.It’s not all rosy. Microsoft has a problem with smartphones, the otherwise excellent Windows Phone OS has failed to get much traction in the market. At the moment, the Nokia acquisition looks more like a millstone around the company’s neck than an asset. Nadella will need to conjure something magical to cure that problem.
Filed under: Microsoft Tagged: personal computer, smartphones, Windows, Windows Phone