Microsoft was the feared beast of high tech in the 1990's. Anyone who went up against Microsoft usually found themselves unable to break free and were soundly stomped into the ground leaving little more than a trace (remember Netscape?). These days though, Microsoft has competitors that are eating its lunch. Whether it be Google or Apple or the myriad of open source vendors, by and large, Microsoft and the Windows brand is passe. If the excitement of Microsoft products was ever really a truism, and I have my doubts, that excitement has given way to companies who are not reliant on Microsoft and products which are capturing the attention of the public (such as the iPhone). So it comes as little surprise that major firm like Gartner would be putting it so bluntly:

"Windows as we know it must be replaced," Gartner said in its presentation.

This is a significant statement by a very highly influential firm. When Gartner speaks, IT directors listen. Statements such as these seemed unthinkable just a few years ago, yet now you can feel the Redmond giant wobbling.

According to Gartner analysts, Microsoft's Windows Vista is in danger of collapsing. The analysts pointed out the slow adoption rate by businesses, just 6% to date, and that the Windows Vista code base is so large.

While speaking at a Las Vegas conference on Thursday, Gartner analysts Michael Silver and Neil MacDonald said that Microsoft's Windows product is collapsing in the and must make radical changes to its operating system or risk becoming doomed.

Doomed. Who would have thought? Now we all know that Microsoft is not heading for bankruptcy court anytime soon, but what this statement from Gartner means is that Microsoft has ceased to be relevant. It's a modern day IBM; huge, stodgy, slow moving, and in decline. Any way that you slice the stats for Vista, they are bleak:

The analysts pointed out the slow adoption rate by businesses, just 6% to date, and that the Vista code base is so large. That means changes take years, and only high end computers can really take advantage of its 64-bit operating system.

Microsoft earns $15 billion a year for Windows alone, and another $16 billion for Office and Exchange Server in 2007. That's 60% of Microsoft's total revenue, and profits from those groups float the rest of the company.

Of course the elephant in the room is what happens when cloud computing is the norm? Certainly it would mean that the backend OS becomes less and less relevant, and it is possible that it is all Linux needs to really damage Microsoft. What the future holds vis-a-vis Microsoft is yet to be written, but we have reached an important point in the high technology market when the top research firm uses words like "doomed" to describe the company that cause so much fear and loathing ten years ago. It's a stark reminder that no company is safe in a disruptive driven industry.



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