At the 2008 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates revealed back on January 6, that Windows Vista had an install base of over 100 million users worldwide. The Redmond company came back with the 100 million Vistas milestone on the operating system's first year anniversary since the product had hit the shelves. In this context, statistics made available by Net Applications for the end of 2007, did support Microsoft's figure, indicating that the latest Windows client had grown in a single year to over 10% of the operating system market.

At the same time, although Microsoft pointed as early as mid 2007 to the existence of over 40 million Software Assurance licenses for Vista, for Volume License customers, adoption in the enterprise environment has been sluggish to say the least. In fact, despite of an early business launch for Vista on November 30, 2006, the operating system failed to gather business customers to it in large numbers. John Curran, head of the Windows Client Group, confirmed the data from a survey put together by Computer Business Review that found Vista upgrades in the business environment to be just 2%. The survey included 300 senior decision-makers in the UK, but Curran admitted that the percentage was reflected globally.

"Those numbers are consistent with how we would see it so far in our core markets like the US, UK, and so on," Curran has explained, emphasizing that Microsoft is still pleased with Vista's adoption pace, even as far as businesses are concerned, since the uptake is more than what the company saw for Windows XP. "The decision to migrate their desktops from XP to Vista is a big decision, and we appreciate that. We are committed to having all the tools available to help in that migration, and all the information necessary that makes it an informed decision, and as smooth as possible."

Additionally, Curran indicated that Windows Vista Service Pack 1 would be a turning point for the operating system, and that it would accelerate the platform's adoption. "The launch of the first service pack does tend to be a key motivator for enterprises to upgrade," Curran added.