Microsoft Open Technologies, a subsidiary of Microsoft dedicated to free software

Although it may seem that the proprietary software world and the world of free software are separated by an unbridgeable gap, companies like Microsoft (which embody the business model focused on developing proprietary software) collaborate actively in the development of projects open source as Samba or even the Linux kernel (ranks # 17 among the 20 companies that contribute most to the project). With a view to better manage its relationship with the free software world and reverse the results of their collaboration on their own products, Microsoft has created a subsidiary called Microsoft Open Technologies that will manage centrally all related projects free software to be carried out in the corporation.

We believe that this subsidiary will provide the company a new way of relating to the free software community in a much more clear and definite

The president of this subsidiary is Jean Paoli , one of the developers of XML format since 1996 is linked to the Redmond company and in recent years has been in charge of projects related to free software. Much of the work of Paoli at Microsoft has been focused on bringing products from Microsoft towards greater interoperability with free solutions and work towards creating an ecosystem around the company's products.

Indeed, the team that developed the Microsoft interoperability strategy will be responsible for carrying out the mission entrusted to the new subsidiary that will focus on improving results from Microsoft's investment in open standards, interoperability and open source software.

The team has worked very closely with many Microsoft teams working on some initiatives to standardize the company, including projects with W3C HTML5, HTTP 2.0 IETF standards for the cloud (DMTF and OASIS) and many environments Node.js free software, and PhoneGap MongoDV / Cordova

And although this move by Microsoft to attract attention, it really makes perfect sense because it is increasingly common to find mixed environments in which there are open systems and proprietary systems that must interoperate with each other. In fact, interoperability of systems and the use of open standards is becoming a requirement that, fortunately, requires more and requires more closed to rethink its strategy.