Microsoft Reorg Focuses on Business

The server and tools business, which falls under the leadership of Senior Vice President Bob Muglia, was moved "intact" from the Platform and Services division to the Business division, whose president is Jeff Raikes, a Microsoft spokesperson told eWEEK.

"Really, this is about alignment, focusing on the platform and services and bringing all of the products Microsoft sells into businesses into a single division," the spokesperson said. "Microsoft senior leadership decided to make these changes to sharpen leadership focus on the company's top priorities and align its organization for innovation, ultimately enabling it to deliver even more value to its customers."

The developer and platform evangelism team, led by Corporate Vice President Sanjay Parthasarathy, has been merged into the server and tools business, and now reports to Muglia. The changes are effective May 18.

Microsoft's Platforms and Services division is responsible for initiatives and products like Windows and Windows Live/MSN, while the business group looks after Microsoft Office, Dynamics ERP and Dynamics CRM.

This is the latest of many company reorganizations in the past two years. In September 2005, Microsoft announced that it was realigning several of its existing units into three core divisions—Platforms and Services, Business, and Entertainment and Devices—that better represented its goals.

Then, at the end of January 2006, it merged the Exchange and Real-Time Collaboration groups into a unit known as the Unified Communications Group.

In March 2006 the company restructured its Platforms and Services division and appointed Steve Sinofsky, who had headed the Office team, to lead the Windows and Windows Live groups, giving him broad responsibility for planning future versions of Windows.

Then, in October 2006, Microsoft restructured its Windows Core Operating System division into five teams in a move designed to better focus on PC hardware and provide a richer set of customer solutions.

Copyright 2007 by Ziff Davis Media, Distributed by United Press International