14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft made an important step into the hardware market on Monday when the Redmond company debuted a new set of handheld devices able to work with its software solutions and replace the classic and old fashioned office tools. Among phones and headsets, Microsoft presented several products able to interact with the company's software solutions and help the users communicate through emails and instant messages with ease. The Redmond firm worked with no more than 9 worldwide names including Samsung, the famous phone producer.
"Today's office phone is marooned on an island, separate from the rest of the communications tools that information workers rely on to do their jobs. By weaving the business phone together with e-mail, instant messaging, presence, conferencing and the productivity software people use most, we are putting voice communications back into business," said Jeff Raikes, president of the Microsoft Business Division, according to a press release published by the software giant.
As you can see, the mobile battle is attracting more and more companies after the two Internet giants Google and Yahoo already challenged one another with their products. As you might know, Google struggles to release new flavors for its products to make them compatible with the mobile devices while Yahoo bets on its search technology, oneSearch.
On Tuesday, the software giant made an intelligent move and tried to lure a different segment of users to the company. Using the newly-introduced Microsoft Math 3.0, the Redmond company aims to attract students, teachers and parents to its solutions. This latest version of Math 3.0 comes after Microsoft conducted a special market research that revealed that 77 percent of teachers and 73 percent of parents sustained math is the most difficult subject for homework. Now, you're able to use the Microsoft application and resolve pre-algebra, algebra, trigonometry, calculus, physics and chemistry problems without help.
"Students often become annoyed when they can't finish their math homework quickly and waste time searching for help. Microsoft Math helps reduce that frustration by providing a one-stop shop for help with math and science, "said Dave Brooks, Education Products Group product manager at Microsoft, in a press release published by the Redmond company. "When solving a quadratic equation, Microsoft Math doesn't just churn and spit out one of the solutions," Jonathan Briggs, a high school math teacher at East Side Preparatory School in Kirkland, Wash, added.
On Wednesday, Bill Gates, Microsoft's chairman, sustained that the Redmond-based company managed to sell almost 40 million copies of Windows Vista, the latest release of the operating system. "As of last week, we've (sold) nearly 40 million copies. That's twice as fast as the adoption of Windows XP, the last major release we had," Bill Gates said according to News.com. Windows Vista was one of the most awaited releases of the famous operating system, being launched in January 2007. The company managed to keep Vista in spotlights because it was continuously presenting new features of the application, describing it as the safest version of Windows.
Along with Windows Vista, Microsoft also introduced Office 2007, the latest edition of the well-known suite. As you might know, Microsoft Office is available on both Windows and Mac platforms but the latest version is currently available only for the software giant's operating system. On Wednesday, the company's representatives announced that the compatibility of Office 2007 documents with older Mac versions of the suite will be delayed for a few months. If you didn't know, Office 2007 works with a .docx format while the older releases are based on a simple .doc extension.
On Thursday, the software giant announced a partnership with the Clinton Foundation to help large cities monitor the gas emissions. According to the deal, the two companies will develop technologies and services to track and reduce the gas emissions in the largest cities of the country. This agreement comes after a short period of time since Yahoo announced its new campaign to encourage users to protect the planet. The Yahoo program, codenamed Be a Better Planet, promotes almost the same ideas as Microsoft's agreement and offers several prizes for the users involved.
"The Clinton Foundation is committed to a business-oriented approach to the problem of climate change," said Bruce Lindsey, CEO of the Clinton Foundation in a statement published on Microsoft's website. "This new software tool will be an important resource in our work with cities around the world to fight global warming in practical, measurable and significant ways," he added.
On Friday, Microsoft joined the battle between Google and Yahoo by acquiring aQuantive, Inc., an advertising company that will bring the Redmond company closer to the two giants. According to an official Microsoft statement, the software giant paid no more than $6 billion for aQuantive, a firm able to attract numerous advertisers, publishers and ad agencies.
"The advertising industry is evolving and growing at an incredible pace, moving increasingly toward online and IP-served platforms which dramatically increases the importance of software for this industry. Today's announcement represents the next step in the evolution of our ad network from our initial investment in MSN, to the broader Microsoft network including Xbox Live, Windows Live and Office Live, and now to the full capacity of the Internet," said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer of Microsoft," in a press release published by the Redmond company.
As you know, Google is currently the owner of the most powerful online advertising platforms, AdSense and AdWords having a considerable number of clients. AdSense allows users to earn money by placing adverts on their websites while AdWords helps companies advertise their products on the Internet. Recently, Google acquired DoubleClick, an advertising firm while Yahoo tried to response with the acquisition of Right Media.
