Microsoft’s new CEO Satya Nadella visited the Fortune Brainstorm tech conference Monday. And as Mashable’s Chris Taylor points out, Nadella was animated and idealistic but “short on specifics.”
When asked about Microsoft wearables, for instance, Nadella replied with three short words, and nothing more: “We have ambitions,” he said.
Still, Microsoft’s former cloud guru offered an interesting answer when asked if his company could learn a thing or two from Google and its experimental X Labs that build the company’s “moonshot” projects like Glass and the self-driving car.
From Fortune’s Dan Primack:
Nadella on learning from google moonshots: “always a lot to learn from people who market themselves well.” #FortuneTech
— danprimack (@danprimack) July 14, 2014
Nadella’s comment may come across as subtle gamesmanship, but he’s also right. So far, Google’s Sergey Brin has done an excellent job drumming up hype for his company’s semi-secret lab since 2010, but all of its current projects are in their infancy stages. In other words, nothing from Google X is ready for the public just yet.
There’s also Calico, Google’s life extension project to help us cheat death, and Google’s plan to build robots for businesses, but both of those particular projects aren’t considered part of the X Labs. They are, however, still considered moonshots.
Google has rejected plenty of other ideas, including a hoverboard, a space elevator, teleportation, and a user-safe jetpack. But all of Google’s moonshots, as wild as they sound, are still a big part of Google’s image. For example, Google Glass is one of the few Google X projects to actually leave the labs. It’s also one of Google’s most public products in general. But so far the head-mounted wearable has yet to make the general public feel comfortable or live up to the company’s own expectations. Its own creator said Google Glass “has a long way to go.” — For more information read the original article here.
