Pedro Hernandez

The volume on the buzz surrounding the selection of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s successor, along with the software maker’s stock price, has been rising since news surfaced that the company is currently considering a shortlist of potential chief executives with considerable clout. Among them is Nokia CEO Stephen Elop. Microsoft has reportedly winnowed a list […]

Continuing to blur the line between its productivity software and enterprise social networking tech, Microsoft has announced that all Office 365 Enterprise customers are now also entitled to licenses of Yammer Enterprise. It’s not the first time Microsoft has bundled Yammer with Office 365. In March, the company began including Yammer Enterprise for customers enrolled […]

Microsoft is making it easier for far-flung colleagues to work together on Office documents by switching on new live, multiuser editing features on the cloud-delivered versions of its productivity apps. The feature was first previewed in May by Amanda Lefebvre, a Microsoft product marketing manager. “We’ll introduce real time co-authoring in the Office Web Apps […]

Windows XP holdouts may soon face an explosion of malware that targets the unsupported operating system, cautions Microsoft. The company is ending support for its enduring, 12-year-old desktop operating system on April 8, 2014. On that date, “Microsoft will no longer provide support for Windows XP users. This means that customers and partners will no […]

During the Microsoft Dynamics Convergence 2013 EMEA conference in Barcelona, Spain, the company unveiled new features and enhancements for its customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) software suites. Eighteen new configurable process templates from the company have been added to the Dynamics CRM Marketplace. The free templates cover a number of industries, […]

Microsoft has agreed to purchase 100 percent of the power generated by the Keechi Wind Farm Project in Texas for 20 years. Headed by energy developer RES Americas, construction on the project is set to begin in December about 70 miles northwest of Fort Worth. By the end of 2015, it will encompass 55 wind […]

Surface Pro 2 now lasts longer between charges, according to new tests performed by PC enthusiast site AnandTech. After the Surface Pro 2 hit store shelves Oct. 22, Microsoft released a firmware update that allowed its Marvell WiFi components to enter into lower power states, stretching the tablet’s battery life and helping users eke out […]

Microsoft and other big tech companies, still reeling from allegations that they help facilitate National Security Agency (NSA) spying, have joined together to voice their support for the USA Freedom Act, which would rein in the agency’s surveillance activities The Washington Post published a letter, dated Oct. 31, from several influential tech companies and addressed […]

As an Xbox peripheral, Kinect may be (mostly) fun and games for Microsoft, but the company’s research arm has other, more serious designs for the sensor technology. Microsoft Research Asia, working with the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Beijing Union University, has devised a prototype that translates spoken language into sign language, and vice versa, […]

In its ongoing efforts to build a smarter planet, tech heavyweight IBM is teaming with female entrepreneurs to promote women in leadership roles and bring disruptive new innovations to market. Women make up just over half of the population in the United States, according to the U.S. Census Bureau (50.8 percent), and they own 28.8 […]

Microsoft announced that HDInsight, its cloud-based distribution of Hadoop, is now generally available after spending over half a year in preview. Quentin Clark, vice president of Microsoft’s Data Platform Group, stated in an Oct. 28 blog post that reaching this stage “is an important milestone for Microsoft, as it’s part of our broader strategy to […]

NEW YORK—Lenovo unveiled two new Yoga tablets, low-cost Android slates that take a bit of a departure from the familiar, flat-as-a-board form factor that has ruled the device class. Taking the stage at the Helen Mills Theater at a press event in New York City, Jay Parker, Lenovo’s North American president, took aim at the […]