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Xbox Founder, Internal Slate Advocate Leaves Microsoft

One of the few real consumer stars at Microsoft submitted his resignation this week, according to Seattle Times blogger Brier Dudley.

To review Otto Berkes' career at Microsoft is to tour the company's great consumer successes and its most promising scuttled consumer projects.

Otto Berkes
Otto Berkes

Berkes was the last of the four original Xbox founders still at the company, built the slate-like touchscreen computing device that Bill Gates showed at a 2005 conference, worked on the Courier project, served as general manager for former Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie and most recently was involved in Bing datacenter design.

In an exit interview with Dudley, Berkes declined to pin his departure on the environment at Microsoft or complain about current management. In explaining his move to a company he wouldn't identify after 18 years at Microsoft, he said, "No regrets, but it's time to move on for me...I'm very proud of what I was able to accomplish here."

Check out the blog post; it's a good read with a lot of valuable context if you're interested in Microsoft and its future. Microsoft will have a tougher time catching the consumerization wave that is breaking over IT without Berkes' experienced eye.

Posted by Scott Bekker on May 26, 2011


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