Microsoft Embraces Agile and Lean Artificial Intelligence

October 6, 2016

I read “Internal Email: Microsoft Forms News 5,000 Person AI Division.” If the information is accurate, Microsoft brings its agile and lean management methods to smart software. I learned from the article:

Microsoft says it has formed a new 5,000-person engineering and research team to focus on its artificial intelligence products — a major reshaping of the company’s internal structure reminiscent of its massive pivot to pursue the opportunity of the Internet in the mid-1990s.

Microsoft’s pivot to the Internet created the outstanding series of Internet Explorer releases. A similar shift in Windows brought the world Windows Vista, and, of course, the SharePoint collaboration, content management, search, and kitchen sink thing.

According to Microsoft:

End-to-end innovation in AI will not come from isolated research labs alone, but from the combination of at-scale production workloads together with deep technology advancements in algorithms, systems and experiences. The new group will provide greater opportunity to accelerate our innovation in AI, and to enable Microsoft to create truly intelligent systems and products for our customers.

I hoped that Tay would have some words of wisdom about the reorganization. The future of Microsoft Word’s numbering feature or achieving consistent menus in Visio may be on the agenda.

Then there’s SharePoint search. One hopes that its stellar technology informs other Microsoft products, including the pay-to-use promotion for Edge and Bing.

Stephen E Arnold, October 6, 2016

Comments

Comments are closed.

  • Archives

  • Recent Posts

  • Meta