Microsoft looks to economy, energy savings in 2009

Microsoft will focus its 2009 business platforms on efforts to help companies overcome the economic impact of the current crisis, on a new software strategy for the next few years and more efficient Internet usage.
Michael Hartmann, Senior Director and Business and Marketing Officer for Central and East Europe, Microsoft, told a press briefing in Nicosia that people are more cautious and not meeting previous targets.
“Ukraine has felt a deep impact of the financial crisis, while the effect on IT in smaller economies like Cyprus and Croatia is mild. People tend to cut too much.
“For a business to be strong, it needs to invest in innovation. We, at Microsoft, have not cut back on developers, as we believe that IT and software are the key enablers for innovation.
Hartmann proposes four themes to save money:
– Consolidate IT infrastructure, especially service (virtualisation). Only 13-18% of a server is utilized and the rest is wasted. The aim is to boost utilization to 60-70%.
– Unified Communication and virtual teaming. Using products such as Office Communicator, Instant Messenger, Voice-over-IP and email could save up to 25% of telecom costs, also achieving savings in hardware maintenance.
– Optimise infrastructure through an assessment and moving to a dynamic environment could save 100 euros per PC, as support and maintenance costs are drastically reduced.
– Energy consumption. Vista is a key enabler in this area. Research company IDC found that on a network of 1,000 PCs, Vista saved 7000 euros a year as a more efficient-running operating system, that translates to about 7 euros per PC, as power management is improved.
“We have virtualized all our servers at Microsoft, whereby we have achieved a lower cost and easier management, with a real saving of $5 mln a year in telecom services alone,” Hartmann said.
“This decade will be all about service and software – securing of onsite software, a service that can be deployed globally and in the end both concepts are combined using software on the premises and software as a service,” he explained.
Hartmann added that the ideal combination is the hybrid model with benefits derived from connected experiences and synchronizing; freedom of how to deploy software; “identity federating” into multiple services; and through cooperation with developers who are given the opportunity to create smaller and more efficient programmes.