14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft’s new education push with Windows 10 S and the Surface Laptop is specifically aimed at slowing down the growth experienced by Google’s Chrome OS and Chromebooks, which have more or less conquered the education market in the last couple of years.
And while Microsoft’s recent product unveilings were announced with much fanfare and received with enthusiasm by fans across the world, Google says it has absolutely no reason to worry about the strategy embraced by its Redmond-based rival.
In fact, Google’s Prabhakar Raghavan, the vice-president in charge of G Suite, says the search company is pleased to see its approach being adopted by others, adding that the education market is the only one to benefit from the increasing competition here.
“I'm happy to see a validation of the approach we've taken,” he was quoted as saying after Microsoft’s press event. “What educational institutions have demanded is simplicity. It's a real test tube for all of us, whether it's Microsoft or any of us, right.”
Students are the ones building our future
Prabhakar Raghavan continued with a message that was also reiterated by Microsoft’s Panos Panay during the May 2 press conference: technology shouldn’t stand in the way of students, as they are the ones who are trying to build the future.
“Because kids do things in amazing ways where you or I would never expect. So here's one of the things we've learned in a study of kids as we were developing all our tools for classrooms, right. We would put a Chromebook in front of a kid, they would whip out their phone and write their essay. We said 'no no no, there's a keyboard there, you can use it,' and they still write the essay there,” he said.
“They said 'we'll use the keyboard to touch up the formatting, but it'll be much faster here,' right. This is something we consistently learned when we looked at pre-teens ... these kids are really forerunners, the vanguards of human evolution, in some sense, and so it's great to see that some of the approaches we've taken, but I think the world is going to keep evolving and it's a scramble for us to keep up with what people are going to do.”
Microsoft is trying to make its Windows 10 S devices as affordable as Chromebooks, so the cheapest models will be priced from $189. Furthermore, buyers will be allowed to upgrade devices to full Windows 10 Pro from the Windows Store.
At the same time, Microsoft is also building its own Windows 10 S device called the Surface Laptop, but in this case the company is going for premium quality and price, giving more space to partners to dominate this market.