Microsoft Corporation, One of the Big Five Tech Companies in the U.S
Microsoft has its headquarters in Redmond, Washington. It provides a variety of tech-related services. Some of the services they provide include developing, manufacturing, licensing, supporting, and selling computer software, personal computers, and consumer electronics. They are best known for the Microsoft Windows OS, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Office Suite, and Edge Web Browsers. Other than the software products mentioned above, they also have successful hardware products like the Xbox games.
The tech firm was started by Bill Gates and his friend, Paul Allen, on April 4, 1975. They wanted to sell and develop BASIC interpreters for the Altair 8800. Their rise to success happened in the mid-1980s after the release of MS-DOS. After that, they continued experiencing success, which was seen through their products.
Below are some of the successes the Microsoft corporation has experienced since its founding.
- Windows 95
Windows 95 launched with $300 million worth of marketing campaign. Individuals such as Jay Leno and Rolling Stones backed up the launch of the software. Windows 95 designed the first OS design that is typically used with any operating system. The Windows 95 software cemented Microsoft as the OS for all computers at the time.
The software was released together with Internet Explorer, which came in the Microsoft Plus! Package. Instead, it had The Microsoft Network, which was Microsoft’s dial-up online service. For people to access the Internet Explorer, they had to update the versions they had by buying service packs on discs.
Windows 95 stayed in the market for a few years, making a significant impact in the computing world.
- Microsoft Office
Microsoft Office’s first Word processor meant for MS-DOS had two main notable features. The features were unique at the time, but currently, a lot of individuals take them for granted. The Word processor could italicize, bolden, and underline text functions that were only possible with a mouse.
Microsoft came into the limelight in 1990 with the release of Excel, Word, and PowerPoint. These three programs are the backbone of Office. Microsoft Office, later on, released other programs, which are Access, OneNote, and Outlook.
Microsoft $1.375 billion ion 2000 to obtain Visio and make it a part of Office. The purchase was a success, and it became a part of Office 365. Currently, Microsoft Office dominates the computing market.
- Xbox Consoles
Although Xbox is developed in the gaming world, it had plenty of failures. For instance, the Red Ring of Death fiasco cost the company up to a billion dollars and was still a failure. Also, the Xbox 360 would overheat at a fast rate and eventually die. The company continued improving Xbox features, and finally, it became a significant player in the video game world competing with Nintendo and Sony.
The Xbox 360 sold 77.2 million video game consoles globally. Xbox Live is the most effective online platform with 48 million users. The flagship series of Xbox, Halo, has carried out over $4 billion in sales. The sales will continue with the release of Halo 5.
When Windows first decided to release Xbox, they were plenty of ideas surrounding it. They initially wanted to target casual gamers but ended up with core gamers as their primary audience. They also thought initially of buying Nintendo or giving away the video game for free. But instead decided to buy Rare that designs popular games.
- Windows XP
Windows XP had the best features compared to all of Microsoft’s previous operating systems. It was launched in 2001 and during the first five years of its release it sold and average of 400 million copies. By 2014, they had sold a billion copies of XP.
Windows XP lasted for quite sometime in the market due to the poor reception of Windows Vista. It became the main operating system until the release of Windows 7 in 2012. By that time, it had been in use for slightly over a decade. Currently, it is the third most popular Windows version.