Microsoft is mapping plans for a future without visionary Bill Gates as the world's biggest software giant gears for battle with Google.
WASHINGTON: Microsoft is mapping plans for a future without visionary Bill Gates as the world's biggest software giant gears for battle with Google and others to be the dominant high-technology company.
Gates, who built one of the largest personal fortunes in modern history through Microsoft, announced on Thursday he would give up the daily running of Microsoft by mid-2008 to concentrate on his foundation's work on global health and education issues.
Gates will retain the title of chairman of the group he founded over 30 years ago, while handing over his title of chief software architect to Ray Ozzie, another software industry pioneer.
Ozzie, 50, named person of the year in 1995 by PC Magazine for creating Lotus Notes software, enabling a trend of people working together in groups on computing, will assume a key role at Microsoft as the company faces a potential shift of the computer industry landscape.
"Bill Gates has always dominated the company's technical landscape. But Ray Ozzie's record in the IT industry demands unquestioning respect," said Richard Edwards, senior research analyst at the Butler Group.
"As the father of Lotus Notes, and member of the team that brought one of the first spreadsheet programs to the PC, he will have no problem filling Gates's shoes from a technical perspective. But his vision is to add a Web dimension to, or webify, everything Microsoft does, from the Xbox360 games console to the software products running on millions of PCs," Edwards said.
"That vision will require nerves of steel and unwavering commitment from the Microsoft faithful if this plan is to have any chance of succeeding."
Edwards argued that the number-one task for Microsoft's 'new broom' will be to neutralize the threat from Google, and to then regain control of the desktop and consumer market.
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