Microsoft also subsidizes regional public transport, provided by Sound Transit and King County Metro, as an incentive. It created one of the world’s largest private bus systems, the “Connector”, to transport people from outside the company; for on-campus transportation, the “Shuttle Connect” uses a large fleet of hybrid cars to save fuel. As of January 2011,update it has no products that are completely free from PVC and BFRs.needs update Microsoft’s timeline for phasing out brominated flame retardant (BFRs) and phthalates in all products was 2012 but its commitment to phasing out PVC is not clear. In 2013, Microsoft agreed to buy power generated by a Texas wind project to power one of its data centers.

• As the smartphone industry boomed in the late 2000s, Microsoft had struggled to keep up with its rivals in providing a modern smartphone operating system, falling behind Apple and Google-sponsored Android in the United States.
• The company is planning to upgrade its Mountain View, California, campus on a grand scale.
• As a result, in 2010 Microsoft revamped its aging flagship mobile operating system, Windows Mobile, replacing it with the new Windows Phone OS that was released in October that year.
• On July 29, 2015, Windows 10 was released, with its server sibling, Windows Server 2016, released in September 2016.
• Frequently criticized are the ease of use, robustness, and security of the company’s software.
• The specific computer programs used in the process fall under the Azure Machine Learning and the Azure IoT Hub platforms.

United States government

In August 2012, the New York City Police Department announced a partnership with Microsoft for the development of the Domain Awareness System which is used for police surveillance in New York City. The Surface was unveiled on June 18, becoming the first computer in the company’s history to have its hardware made by Microsoft. Microsoft unveiled Windows 8, an operating system designed to power both personal computers and tablet computers, in Taipei in June 2011. This nonprofit organization is focused on providing support for a cloud computing initiative called Software-Defined Networking. It launched an alliance with Nokia in 2011 and Microsoft worked closely with the company to co-develop Windows Phone, but remained partners with long-time Windows Mobile OEM HTC.

present: Acquisitions, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows 11

On January 18, 2022, Microsoft announced the acquisition of American video game developer and holding company Activision Blizzard in an all-cash deal worth $68.7 billion. In October 2021, Microsoft announced that it began rolling out end-to-end encryption (E2EE) support for Microsoft Teams calls in order to secure business communication while using video conferencing software. In the same month, Microsoft acquired Australia-based video editing software company Clipchamp. In September 2021, it was announced that the company had acquired Takelessons, an online platform that connects students and tutors in numerous subjects. The announcement came with confusion after Microsoft announced Windows 10 would be the last version of the operating system.
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Microsoft Redmond Campus Refresh

The specific computer programs used in the process fall under the Azure Machine Learning and the Azure IoT Hub platforms. Developed in part by researchers from spinnaus sign up Kindai University, the water pump mechanisms use artificial intelligence to count the number of fish on a conveyor belt, analyze the number of fish, and deduce the effectiveness of water flow from the data the fish provide. In August 2018, Microsoft released two projects called Microsoft AccountGuard and Defending Democracy. On June 4, 2018, Microsoft officially announced the acquisition of GitHub for $7.5 billion, a deal that closed on October 26, 2018. The project is dubbed “Azure Government” and has ties to the Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) surveillance program.
In November 2018, the company won a $480 million military contract with the U.S. government to bring augmented reality (AR) headset technology into the weapon repertoires of American soldiers. On November 14, 2014, Microsoft overtook ExxonMobil to become the second most-valuable company by market capitalization, behind only Apple Inc. As of January 2014, Microsoft’s market capitalization stood at $314B, making it the 8th-largest company in the world by market capitalization. Consequently, in February 2011 Microsoft released a corporate bond amounting to $2.25 billion with relatively low borrowing rates compared to government bonds. The company is run by a board of directors made up of mostly company outsiders, as is customary for publicly traded companies.

2011: Microsoft Azure, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Microsoft Stores

In 1990, the Federal Trade Commission examined Microsoft for possible collusion due to the partnership with IBM, marking the beginning of more than a decade of legal clashes with the government. Microsoft released its version of OS/2 to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) on April 2, 1987. IBM had copyrighted the IBM PC BIOS, so other companies had to reverse engineer it for non-IBM hardware to run as IBM PC compatibles, but no such restriction applied to the operating systems.

Gates retired from his role as Chief Software Architect on June 27, 2008, a decision announced in June 2006, while retaining other positions related to the company in addition to being an advisor for the company on key projects. Increasingly present in the hardware business following Xbox, Microsoft 2006 released the Zune series of digital media players, a successor of its previous software platform Portable Media Center. Microsoft moved its headquarters from Bellevue to Redmond, Washington, on February 26, 1986, and went public with an initial public offering (IPO) at the NASDAQ exchange on March 13, with the resulting rise in stock making an estimated four billionaires and 12,000 millionaires from Microsoft employees.

• If you consent to these technologies, we may process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this website.
• The company is run by a board of directors made up of mostly company outsiders, as is customary for publicly traded companies.
• The organization requested that European data protection authorities investigate whether this data processing complies with EU law.
• On February 28, 2025, Microsoft announced that Skype would be shutting down on May 5, 2025, to streamline its focus on Microsoft Teams.
• On January 12, Microsoft released PowerShell Core 6.0 for the macOS and Linux operating systems.
• In June 2025 Microsoft helped suspend the email account of an International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor in the Netherlands who was investigating Israel for war crimes in order to comply with a Trump executive order.
• The announcement came with confusion after Microsoft announced Windows 10 would be the last version of the operating system.

In September 2024, BlackRock and Microsoft announced a $30 billion fund, the Global AI Infrastructure Investment Partnership, to invest in AI infrastructure such as data centers and energy projects. In June 2024, Microsoft announced that it was building a “hyperscale data centre” in South East Leeds. Meanwhile, that month, the company announced a subscription offering of artificial intelligence for small businesses via Copilot Pro. In March 2024, Inflection AI’s cofounders Mustafa Suleyman and Karen Simonyan announced their departure from the company in order to start Microsoft AI, with Microsoft acqui-hiring nearly the entirety of its 70-person workforce. However, the plan was short-lived, as Altman was subsequently reinstated as OpenAI’s CEO and Brockman rejoined the company amid pressure from OpenAI’s employees and investors on its board.
The organization requested that European data protection authorities investigate whether this data processing complies with EU law. In June 2025 Microsoft helped suspend the email account of an International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor in the Netherlands who was investigating Israel for war crimes in order to comply with a Trump executive order. Concerns were raised about Microsoft’s licensing practices potentially locking customers into its services and its AI investments possibly sidestepping regulatory oversight. This inquiry is part of broader efforts by the U.S. government to curb the power of major tech companies, especially under FTC chair Lina Khan. In November 2024, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) launched an investigation into Microsoft, focusing on potential antitrust violations related to its cloud computing, AI, and cybersecurity businesses.