Microsoft Expects 1 Billion Windows Users by 2010

prostoalex writes "The head of Microsoft Windows client division claimed there will be 1 billion Windows users by 2010, while nowadays there are 600 million of them, Microsoft-Watch reports. 35% of Microsoft's enterprise customers are still running Windows 9x and they are ripe for upgrade. Currently Microsoft's desktop PC market share is at 96%, with the closest rival - MacOS from Apple Computer - being installed on 2.8% of the desktops."

Comments

Re:Bravado

[DigitumDei]

Cheap asian copies of windows XP (the legal kind that is).

Re:Linux has a long way to go

[NutscrapeSucks]

Acutally, Linux is barely holding steady in Server Marketshare, while Windows is increasing fast. Just recently, Microsoft broke 50% for new server shipments. For all the Linux hype, that's pretty impressive.

As of yet, there's little evidence that Linux Servers have really broken out of the "Unix Ghetto" -- Apache/Sendmail/Bind/Oracle and into the much larger file/print and office application markets.

its possible

[dncsky1530]

This could also count the number of embedded windows installations on portable devices. I you remember the worlds most installed OS is barely heard of.

Re:No hard evidence here

[tootlemonde]

The report does not say where these extra 400 million are coming.

The article says:

Poole said Microsoft expects the demand to come from enterprises in developed countries, all sizes of companies in developing markets and from OEMs that tailor Windows for specific markets.

Even within Microsoft's existing market there is room for the growth needed to reach a billion installations:

• Education market. There's currently far less than one computer per student.
• Home market. One computer per child is becoming the standard.
• Home servers. Household networks should become more common
• Multiple computers per person. Many more people will have both a home computer and a laptop.
• Corporate servers. As the cost of hardware continues to drop and administering servers becomes easier, the number of corporate servers tends to proliferate.

These are areas for growth for alternate operating systems as well. However, despite the penetration of PCs into all areas of activity, we could still be in the early stages of the adoption of microcomputers.

Re:Linux has a long way to go

[NutscrapeSucks]

These numbers are from IDC, so you'll have to argue methodology with them. They are based on surveys and not only raw sales figures. (A few years ago, when IDC showed massive Linux growth, nobody was arguing with them -- in fact they were quoted by every Linux advocate.) The numbers might not be perfect, but thinking they are radically incorrect is probably a delusion.

2004 Boo! - http://www.wininsider.com/news/?7124
2001 Yeh! - http://www.oreillynet.com/manila/tim/stories/story Reader$56

Re:Double-Counting?

[baelbouga]

Most likely, they are. Afterall, in order to use a Windows Corporate License, you need to have actually had a Windows License to go with each machine. The Corporate License functions more as a upgrade license than an initial license.

Re:Double-Counting?

[plj]

Mod parent up. More Information can be found from this document (Note: MS Word format -- at least OOo works).

The above document and other informative documents about MS licensing can be found here.

Re:No bravado, just ordered optimism

[RoLi]

but MSFT has had record earnings and revenue for the LAST 12 CONSECUTIVE QUARTERS.

Just plain wrong:

Fiscal years 1999 to today, the numbers of fiscal 2004 are extrapolated from the first 3 quarters (= 3 quarters times 4/3)

Revenue Earnings

f1999 19.75 7.78
f2000 22.96 9.42
f2001 25.30 7.35
f2002 28.37 7.83
f2003 32.19 9.99
f2004 ~36.73 ~7.31

As you can see, while revenue is indeed growing, earnings are pretty much staying the same. Windows2000 and the new licensing scheme were good for some short term earning boosts, but in general earnings are around 7.5 billion/year and flat.

Oh, and by the way, the latest quarter with 1.3 billion in earnings was the worst Microsoft had since fiscal 1/02 (which was 1.2 billions). And of course the numbers vary on a quarter-to-quarter basis, there were never 12 consecutive record quarters in the last 5 years for Microsoft.

And it's quite possible that fiscal year 2004 (which ended 2 weeks ago) will be Microsoft's worst since fiscal year 1998, we'll see soon.

Re:No bravado, just ordered optimism

[electroniceric]

Mod parent up again for this statement:

So, at 300 billion, Microsoft is clearly overrated - UNLESS there are some huge market opportunities out there.... But those have evaporated.

Microsoft has spent the last two or three years casting around looking for the next "killer app" in the enterprise desktop and consumer spaces - MSN, XBox, DRM, .NET, etc. As the parent astutely points out, there are precious few areas of vast untapped market need just poised for a killer app. Think for example, of the colossal nonevent that is the Friendster phenomenon. The rest of the large players software industry (Oracle, SAP, IBM, etc.) have done things like

• transition to a consulting and process improvement role
• focus on applying big iron to make the incalculable calculable a la Google or IBM (e.g. LifeSciences)
• focus on niche markets (small companies do this as well) Microsoft seems to be betting that these guys have missed something big in the general-app consumer or enterprise space.

The features they have planned for Longhorn are merely an huge extension of that bet. A well-executed enterprise-wide search/filesystem integration would indeed be a useful addition, but will hardly be a must-have in 2008, if the trend towards somewhat-on-the-corpnet machines like laptops and wireless PDA's persists.

If Longhorn succeeds, it will indeed propel the growth numbers that Microst projects. But it could very easily end up being a good product that's just not that relevant.

Re:Users or installations

[AstroDrabb]

Those numbers must have a very big margin of error. For example, the laptop I bought had windows XP Home on it. I did not have a choice. The first thing I did was put Linux on it. I didn't even boot to XP. My 2 desktops had XP Home, again I did the same thing to my desktops that I did to my laptop. So according to MS, I count as 3 "Windows PCs" when in fact, I should count as zero?