While companies such as Intel are laying off thousands, Microsoft islooking to hire 5,000 bodiesor so to bolster their research & development department. R&D is always good in my book. The success of the company, whether you like them or not, is astounding:
On the operating system front, Jim Allchin, group vice president at Microsoft, said Windows XP has now sold more than 46 million copies in the nine months since its release, making it the fastest-selling version of Windows ever. Microsoft says that XP has sold 230 percent more copies than Windows 95 and 160 percent more than Windows 98 for the same time period after their debut.
Of course, not everything with the Microsoft Trademark necessarily explodes into success. The most recent example has been Microsoft .NET, which hasdisappointedthe chairman in terms of its lackluster start. Gates sees Microsoft’s failure to deliver as the primary problem, not weak interest among developers. In fact, he gives the company a big ‘C’. That might sound not so good, but to me, C = F. Ah, the joys of grade inflation!
