Monday, September 18th 2023
Panos Panay, Head of Windows & Surface Departments, Leaves Microsoft
Panos Panay, Microsoft's chief product officer—where he has lead development on Windows (since 2020) and the company's Surface device product line (from the start)—is leaving the American multinational technology corporation. He made it official on X this afternoon: "After 19 incredible years at Microsoft, I've decided to turn the page and write the next chapter. I'm forever grateful for my time at Microsoft and the amazing people I had the honor to make products with." In an email sent to employees, Rajesh Jha (vice president of experience and devices) said: "After nearly 20 years at the company, Panos Panay has decided to leave Microsoft. Panos has had an incredible impact on our products and culture as well as the broader devices ecosystem. Under Panos' leadership, the team created the iconic Surface brand with loved products. More recently, as the leader of Windows, the team has brought amazing services and experiences to hundreds of millions with Windows 11 on innovative devices including those from our OEM partners. He will be missed, and I am personally very grateful for his many contributions over the years. Please join me in wishing him well."
A press release regarding the high-level departure was released to media outlets not long ago—Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had some kind words: "Thank you, Panos, for your impact on our products, culture, company, and industry over the past two decades. I'm grateful for your leadership, support, and all you've done for Microsoft and our customers and partners. We remain steadfast and convicted in our strategy, and Yusuf Mehdi will take lead on our Windows and Surface businesses and products externally." Mehdi is the current Corporate Vice President & Consumer Chief Marketing Officer, perhaps best known for producing a lot of his company's big artificial intelligence announcements. Microsoft is expected to reveal a bunch of next-gen Surface models later this week—will the new boss be in attendance?
Sources:
Panos Panay Tweet, The Verge, Ars Technica
A press release regarding the high-level departure was released to media outlets not long ago—Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella had some kind words: "Thank you, Panos, for your impact on our products, culture, company, and industry over the past two decades. I'm grateful for your leadership, support, and all you've done for Microsoft and our customers and partners. We remain steadfast and convicted in our strategy, and Yusuf Mehdi will take lead on our Windows and Surface businesses and products externally." Mehdi is the current Corporate Vice President & Consumer Chief Marketing Officer, perhaps best known for producing a lot of his company's big artificial intelligence announcements. Microsoft is expected to reveal a bunch of next-gen Surface models later this week—will the new boss be in attendance?
35 Comments on Panos Panay, Head of Windows & Surface Departments, Leaves Microsoft
Not to mention of course wide spread broadband access is still an illusion, not even developed countries have consistent and widespread access let alone the majority of under developed world
End users don't really matter, we're just beta testers now, it has been a long time since Microsoft bothered charging the end consumers.
A lot of their consumer revenue has shifted to subscription fees like much of the software industry.
What subscriptions are they charging consumers, are that many people subscribing to 365 personally?Gamepass! Of course, nevermindAs for how many people are subscribing to 365 personally, I have no idea. I doubt if Microsoft breaks out this in their quarterly financial statements but there's probably some industry analyst who will guesstimate a number. But for sure some people want the 365 features and are willing to pay for it. Millennials love subscription services (there's even one for kitchen sponges).
The cloud Office apps are fine for people for people with limited needs. Google and Apple have their own too. But I'm okay shelling out a dollar a month for a standalone Office license (assuming 24 month ownership). That's cheaper than an Office 365 subscription fee. But in the end, it'll probably be 5 years before I retire an Office license, so it's really 40 cents a month.
I still don't trust cloud office apps. I need conditional formatting and some more advanced features in Excel anyhow; the cloud versions are less developed anyhow and they don't work so great without a network connection. And I have a handful of documents that I wouldn't want to put in the cloud anyhow (legal, financial, health).
Luckily, it's easy to get full fledged Windows and Microsoft Office at a pittance in 2023. But that's not going to pay many software engineers' salaries. I assume somehow enterprise software revenue is still covering this and that Microsoft looks at PC software as a P&L operation.
For sure, Microsoft has not been consistent over the years. Outlook? Free or payware? Why did they get rid of Outlook Express? Entourage on Mac? Windows versus Mac versus mobile? Cloud versus desktop?
In practice, once you go cloud you are completely reliant to provider service. All your data, all your business is reliant on it. That is maybe acceptable for some "mumbo-jumbo" tech startup, it is maybe OK for third-grade juice producer from... somewhere. But for serious business, that is completely crazy from many standpoints - money is of secondary importance in that matter. Not to mention some more "serious" business, or any company outside the USA "zone of influence" who can tomorrow be left without anything if the USA implements some kind of embargo... Which is happening quite often recently :)
So, no, I do not think that is proper way forward for anyone. The Internet and Personal Computing era was all about freedom - and now we are going in completely opposite direction. Only software companies are the ultimate benefiter of these processes.
All that speech about free market, freedom, and we are actually heading to completely centralizing everything and leaving it in hands of two - three biggest players :) That is crazy.
Windows moving more to the cloud also doesn't necessarily mean microsoft will be the only provider for it - they obsiously would like and prefer it that way but it's unlikely to happen. And in the end, we're still beholden to microsoft whether windows is in the cloud or not.
But compared to the possibility of relying on someone, somewhere... Like I said, for any company outside the US "zone of influence" it is unacceptable. It is political, not a technical question.
Now, multiple providers could be interesting, but that is theory - what we look now, on multiple IT fronts, is two to three companies monopolizing market and then abusing it to the moon and back - both in hardware and software world...