Insight | Microsoft's determination and resolve: Embracing artificial intelligence and laying out the next-generation computing platform

Let’s start with Windows 10

The Windows operating system has always been one of Microsoft's core businesses, but it was barely featured in the opening keynote of this year's Build conference. This inevitably raises the suspicion that "Windows has been marginalized in Microsoft's business." If you look at the data, this suspicion will be further deepened. According to Leifeng.com, the Windows division's revenue was $18 billion in 2010. By fiscal 2016, the revenue of the Personal Computing Division, where Windows is located, had fallen to $14.7 billion, lower than the $23.6 billion of the Productivity Division, where Office is located, and the $19.2 billion of the Intelligent Cloud Division, and the revenue contribution ratio was only 17%.

The Windows segment was weak for two reasons:

First, the personal PC market, the main battlefield of Windows, has been close to saturation. According to data released by Gartner, a well-known IT research and consulting company, the total global PC shipments in the first quarter of 2017 were 62.2 million units, a further decrease of 2.4%. This is the 10th consecutive quarter of decline and the first time since 2007 that global PC shipments have fallen below 63 million units in a single quarter.

Second, Microsoft has invested a lot in the mobile terminal market in recent years, but ultimately failed miserably. As we all know, Microsoft began to implement a reduction plan for Windows Phone two years ago. In Microsoft's third quarter 2017 financial report, the profitability of the Windows phone business was no longer mentioned. Microsoft has also confirmed that they will not inject more funds into the mobile phone business. On May 2, Microsoft officially announced for the first time that it would remove the Lumia series of products from the shelves.

Is Windows Phone dead?

Yes, but also not right.

Joe Belfiore, the head of Windows Phone, who is popular among fans as "Joe Beifeng", made a public appearance at the Build conference last week and talked about the future of Windows Phone in an interview with the media. He said: "We will continue to support Windows Phone."

In addition, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella made a bold statement in a recent interview with Molly Wood: "I'm sure we will make more phones, but they will look different from today's phones."

What this means is that Microsoft is no longer obsessed with the demise of Windows phones, but this does not mean that Microsoft intends to give up the mobile terminal market. In the current environment, if Microsoft insists on competing with iOS and Android, it will have no advantage at all. But smartphones have entered a bottleneck period of innovation and are likely to be replaced by new computing platforms in the future, which may be mixed reality or other devices. Microsoft's goal is to seize the opportunity when the next generation of computing platforms comes. To do this, Microsoft must continue to cultivate the mobile phone market. To this end, Microsoft has done the following things:

1. Bring iTunes to Windows Store. Earlier this month, Microsoft released Windows 10 S for the campus market. This lightweight system can only install apps from the Windows Store, which means that apps such as iTunes cannot run. But Microsoft soon announced at the Build conference that Apple is developing a Windows Store version of iTunes. After this fall, you can sync your iPhone and iPad on Windows 10 S devices.

2. Develop applications for iOS and Android. According to a rough estimate by Leifeng.com, Microsoft has developed dozens of applications for iOS and Android respectively.

3. Two major updates. Microsoft recently released two major updates for the Windows 10 operating system: Creators Update and Fall Creators Update just announced at the Build conference. Through these two updates, Microsoft redesigned the interactive interface and enhanced the cross-platform collaboration capabilities of the Windows system.

Microsoft is trying to retain iPhone users by opening its own app store, while quietly building its own ecosystem on iOS and Android platforms by helping iOS and Android develop apps. The attack and defense show wisdom. This is also the purpose of Microsoft's enhancement of cross-platform collaboration capabilities in updates. Take Clipboard as an example. After upgrading this feature, you can copy a piece of content on a Windows computer and paste it on various Android and iOS devices. Apple already has this feature, but Apple only supports its own devices, while Windows will support operations on all platforms.

The purpose of redesigning the interactive interface is to lay out the next generation of computing platforms in advance. Because changes in design language often mean changes in operating systems. At the Build conference, Microsoft released a design language called "fluent design". This design language originated from Microsoft's gaming platform Xbox platform, and its biggest features are light, depth, dynamics and materials. Highlights, shadows and textures together give the "fluent design" system a three-dimensional sense, which is crucial in 3D operating systems. As VR technology becomes more mature and is continuously applied to various fields, multi-dimensional operating systems continue to emerge. But so far, no technology company knows how to combine the old world of 2D devices with 3D operating systems. The purpose of Microsoft's "fluent design" design is to seamlessly connect 2D and 3D operating systems and lay out the next generation of computing platforms in advance.

Let’s talk about cloud and artificial intelligence

Entering the Internet age, we are generating a large amount of data every day. With the advent of the era of the Internet of Everything, the volume of this data will usher in exponential growth. The key to the next technological revolution of mankind is hidden in this ocean of data. For the processing of big data, cloud computing has almost perfectly demonstrated its powerful functions. Major technology giants have already made their plans: Amazon's AWS is far ahead; Nvidia also reiterated the concept of GPU cloud at the recent GTC conference; and Google has just launched the latest global distributed relational database Cloud Spanner. Microsoft's increase in cloud services is not only due to the call of the market and competitors, but also due to its own needs (cloud services are essential to achieve cross-platform collaboration capabilities of Windows systems.)

At the Build conference, Microsoft announced a series of new developments regarding Azure cloud services. They can be summarized as follows:

Launched Azure Cloud Shell, a development tool that supports multi-language, multi-platform, and mobile applications.

Released Cosmos DB, a cloud database service that allows developers to elastically scale across regions.

Launched the new Azure IoT Edge cloud service, which delivers AI and advanced analytics tools to enabled devices.

If adding cloud services is focusing on the present, then artificial intelligence represents Microsoft's plan for the future.

At this year's Build conference, discussions about artificial intelligence were almost everywhere, and this was not accidental. Because at the just-opened Google I/O conference and the recent GTC conference, artificial intelligence was the undisputed protagonist and grabbed almost all the attention. In the future, artificial intelligence will penetrate into every vertical field and will trigger profound changes. Today, the most obvious experience for ordinary consumers is in the home scene.

Amazon's previously launched Echo smart speaker has already exceeded the 5 million sales mark in the North American market, which can be said to be a great success. Google followed closely and launched the Assistant voice assistant and Google Home speaker. According to Leifeng.com (public account: Leifeng.com), Assistant has been installed and used on 100 million devices, and at the I/O conference just now, Assistant ushered in 6 major updates. It is rumored that Apple is also secretly developing a smart speaker device with a screen running Siri, which is now on the verge of being released. Microsoft has teamed up with Harman Kardon to launch the smart speaker Invoke with the addition of the artificial intelligence voice assistant Cortana, and it is said that Microsoft is also improving Windows to adapt to more small-screen home devices and serve as the center of the smart home.

Of course, these are just the gains and losses of a city or a place. For Microsoft, the key to winning the next era lies in how to attract more developers. Compared with Google's open source deep learning development platform TensorFlow, Microsoft's CNTK is not necessarily much behind in technology, but the former is obviously more attractive to developers. The secret is that when we mention Microsoft, we are always used to describing it as an "old technology giant". Microsoft always gives people a sense of decadence, while Google looks much younger.

In order to attract more developers, Microsoft tried its best to show a vibrant feeling at this build conference and provided developers with a lot of support. For example, in terms of computing power, Microsoft has Azure cloud services all over the world; in terms of algorithms, Microsoft Artificial Intelligence Research Institute has been conducting relevant research; in terms of data, Microsoft can help developers access more data through its various services, and own and control data on a trusted platform.

In addition, Microsoft has fully integrated artificial intelligence with its existing businesses. For example, the latest Azure IoT Edge service, in which various sensors and small computing devices track data in industrial scenarios, is then analyzed by Microsoft's cloud and AI tools.

In short, at this year's Build conference, Microsoft was both resolute and determined. It chose to accept and face the mistakes it made in the mobile terminal market in the past, and no longer struggled in vain; it turned around and looked into the distance and the future. This may be the secret of the long-term prosperity of this old technology giant in the past few decades. However, the road ahead is long and there are still many uncertainties: What exactly is the next generation computing platform? What tricks are Microsoft's competitors hiding? What surprises will Microsoft bring us in the future? Let's wait and see!