Microsoft's involvement in the territory of virtualization first began with the acquisition of Connectix Corporation, materializing as the Microsoft Virtual PC back in 2003. Microsoft has undertaken a trajectory that aims at bringing it to the top of the virtualization market by offering its products for free.

Microsoft's desktop virtualization platform, Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 SP1, is going to be available for download for free. The announcement was mage at the Redmond Company's Velocity 2006 partner conference. In Microsoft's view the initiative is part of a wider program that is trying to implement what is known as Software Assurance that has at its basis a Windows Vista Enterprise licensing plan. The Software Assurance program aims at easing the transition from older versions of the Windows operating system to Vista as it offers the possibility of running up to four copies of Windows in virtual machines on a single device.

The Redmond Company has all the interest to sacrifice the revenue from its desktop virtualization product in order to facilitate the migration of Windows users to its latest OS coming out in January 2007. In this regard Virtual PC 2004 SP1 will be joined in the following year's first quarter by Virtual PC 2007 for Windows Vista, also offered free.