Last week was particularly interesting for me as it had Microsoft’s Ignite event — and separately a handful of us analysts got to see Huawei’s operating system strategy.
Microsoft is starting to accelerate now that they completed their cloud focus pivot, and last week, they had two huge announcements in Microsoft Mesh and Microsoft Viva.
Mesh promised to end the need for business travel by rapidly maturing Holoportation into something far closer to teleportation. Viva promised to turn any company into a far better place to work and advance your career.
But one component of Viva particularly caught my eye: Viva Connections — which is very much like what Facebook should have become, but targeted at the critical intra-company relationships people are missing right now during the pandemic.
The Huawei briefing showcased a strategy driven by U.S. sanctions to create a better alternative to Apple’s OS model by going to where iOS is going, but getting there before Apple can. That goal is a universal OS that covers PCs, smartphones, tablets, TVs, and IoT devices to perfect integration across all of them.
Let’s talk about both this week — and work in Microsoft Mesh as my product of the week. Let’s start with Huawei…