Microsoft Live: Surface Pro 4 is coming to India by January, confirms Satya Nadella

Surface Pro 4 is coming to India by January, confirms Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

“People of India have a tremendous opportunity ahead and we want to play a small part so that they can achieve their potential,” he says.
11.20 am

“One thing we are excited about is what app developers can do. One such developer, StaffPad, has changed the way music is composed. A R Rahman is a big user of StaffPad,” says Satya Nadella.

11.08 am

“Last big ambition is more personal computing, more types of computing. We want to innovate on form and function. Holo Lens in particular is such a new medium,” says Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

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“Second ambition is about building about an intelligent cloud. It helps you take advantage of one of your core assets, and that is data. We are now seeing the owner of the cloud manifest across the entire landscape of India,” says the Microsoft chief.

Nadella goes on to give examples of Virtual Agri Services and LV Prasad Eye institute. “States likes Andhra Pradesh are analysing where dropout rates are high and predicting what may happen. They are focusing scarce resources in places where they get better outcomes,” he adds.

“It is mind-blowing to see how e-commerce is progressing in India,” says Satya Nadella.

11.00 am 

“One big cultural change has been the use of Business Insights for work. Not only is it a dashboard, it is also a canvas. That is the kind of power BI tools married with big data can give. Productivity tools is not an abstract concept, it is important for all leaders in this room to use this,” says Nadella.

10.50 am

“We are not stopping at building a phone that can run apps. We are keen on creating a full PC experience from the phone. Windows Continuum is a great feature in a market like India,” says Nadella.

Nadella is now giving a demo of Outlook. Delve Analytics which gives insight to your time spent at work, all your communications.

10.45 am

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is now on stage. Nadella says there is going to be more computing in our lives in the next 10 years. “Computing will be everywhere, what will be key is our mobility of our human experience through all this computing. That is where the cloud is important.”

Microsoft has three interlocking ambitions: reinvention of productivity and business process and bringing them together; building an intelligent cloud and transforming personal computing. The Microsoft CEO is now giving a demo of Microsoft tools on the iPhone. 

Satya Nadella says that the Microsoft Lumia 950XL, the phone that is he using on the stage, will become available in India in the next couple of months.

10.40 am

Now, Maharashtra wants to make industrial areas smart and infuse more technology in the education sector. “We are trying to integrate technology into every field,” says CM Fadnavis. 

Bhaskar Pramanik says Microsoft decided to set up two of its three data centres in Maharashtra because the state ranked so high in terms of infrastructure.

10.35 am

Devendra Fadnavis says Maharashtra has always been a preferred destination for industry though ease of doing business was lacking. “Have brought down the number of permission needed from 76 to 36 and will bring this down to 25,” he says adding that everything is being moved to an e-platform.

“Right to services act has made it the duty of the public servant to do the services within a stipulated time unless which people have a legal recourse. ICT and play a major role in empowering people, ” says the Maharashtra CM.

“Creating smart cities is creating efficiency. Unless our cities become efficient, we will be exploiting nature. We can also create smart villages,” he says, adding that with help from Microsoft, the first digital village is coming up at Arisal, where malnutrition has been rampant for many years.

“Creating one village will not suffice, have told Satya we need to create 50 such villages in 2016,” says Fadnavis

10.30 am

Anand Mahindra says the future is inthinking small and empowering local communities in the way Gandhi envisioned. He drew a parallel from Hindu mythology where Ganesha circled his parents saying they were his world to suggest that democratisation through digitisation is where the world should be headed.

“Digitisation is helping us reconceputualise our world. There is a different fork in the road you can take.”

9.30 am 

Bhaskar Pramanik, Microsoft India head, says company is celebrating 25 years in India. “Future Unleashed” will become an annual event.

Lakshmi Pratury, who is curating the event, says “Future Unleashed” will be about stories and ideas.

Microsoft is showcasing its intentions as well as clout with local partners at the Future Unleashed event in Mumbai. The event, arguably the largest organised by the Silicon Valley giant in India, will be addressed by CEO Satya Nadella, Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis and industry leaders like Anand Mahindra.

Nadella’s second visit to India, since he became Microsoft’s CEO, comes soon after another Silicon Valley leader Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg visited IIT Delhi. Both Nadella and Zuckerberg’s India visits have taken place a month after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s successful trip to Silicon Valley.

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Nadella is expected to make some big ticket announcements as a part of his company’s ‘Future Unleashed’ programmed in Mumbai on Thursday. It is tough to hazard a guess, but the announcements could be more of a macro nature and those that could increase Microsoft’s footprint in India over the years. So education, health, smart cities and digital infrastructure could what Nadella focuses on today.