Bill Gates: Surface, the iPad and approaches of Apple and Microsoft

Bill Gates addressed the subject of the entry of Microsoft into the club of manufacturers of tablets, during a television interview (at 29 min), and that the difference in approach with Apple. If things were to do again, Charlie Rose asked, his interlocutor, "Do you have followed an approach of vertical integration as Steve Jobs did?"

Without calling into question the whole scheme chosen by Microsoft, Bill Gates replied that this model of integration could be defended on a few occasions "For certain types of new devices, when a major change is needed or you need to reinvent the format a device, this principle of design from beginning to end can really afford a brand new product launch.” However, this model would not be sustainable in the long run "Then you get into situations where some people want something more, others much less, and you need diversity.”

Bill Gates believes that ultimately the two approaches, vertical and horizontal, can coexist within the same company. This is the challenge that calls for Microsoft partners to launch tablet unveils his before and almost everyone "Actually, I think you can have the best of both worlds. You can have a rich ecosystem of manufacturers and you can have some reference devices that stand out and raise the question of the difference between a tablet and a PC. “

Found in about a leitmotif that Gates will make no compromise with Windows 8, where the distinction between mobile OS and OS desktop fades "You can have whatever you like a tablet, everything you love a PC, all in one device. This may well change the way people see. “

Charlie Rose, then recalled that Microsoft had arrived on the shelves and touch systems long before Apple, "Far too early," said Bill Gates in a smile "things could have been done differently to reach a critical threshold" that threshold leading to a virtuous circle where the popularity of the product leads to the creation of applications and in turn lower prices of these devices. A threshold below which the tablets remained Windows "completely forgotten today, and you have another device that will cross this threshold, even slightly, and even being released much later, and which flies and becomes something enormous. "

But why Steve Jobs has succeeded has over this hump and not you? asked Charlie Rose "He managed to do things better than me." This was played on several criteria; Gates says "The timing, engineering, simply the product as a whole. Tablets that had been made were not as thin or attractive than what happened then. "However, Judge Bill Gates obviously with Surface," Microsoft has something that could reshuffle the cards. "And to insist on the ability of this tablet to be not only a vehicle for content to be consulted, but a tool for creating these contents" This is why the categories of PCs and tablets have been distinct, there you have something that merges the best of both. When you tie the knot of two categories that were separated, there is always that question of what name will win. We call it a "Windows 8 device", but because of the importance of the PC, the fact that it has the most applications, it has a keyboard, maybe we will call a PC Perhaps we need a new term, maybe people just call the surface or surface-type devices. “

Does Apple must change and must create something that has the functionality of what you describe, of what size? "It's premature," Gates replied, but in his heart he determines that there is "a strong possibility [Apple] do it." For the meeting of two worlds, and the tablet PC is its point of view, he admits to being biased, a "fundamental event.”