Microsoft Research Celebrates 15th Birthday

Published: October 4, 2006

by Alex Woodie

Windows Media Photo. Data mining enhancements in SQL Server. Spam filters in Outlook. These are just some of the technologies that came out of Microsoft Research. Last week, chairman Bill Gates' image was beamed into the company's labs in Redmond, Washington, to help celebrate the renowned group's 15th year.

Microsoft Research, which employs more than 700 computer scientists, psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, and medical doctors at five laboratories around the world, has developed hundreds of product innovations delivered in Microsoft products since 1991. The organization has also been pivotal in Microsoft's patent drive; it recorded its 5,000th patent earlier this year.

"From the beginning, Microsoft Research has provided an open, collaborative environment where the brightest minds in computer science can work together to tackle the hardest problems in computing and explore new ideas for reinventing the PC," Gates said. "During the past 15 years, Microsoft researchers have contributed amazing breakthroughs and insights that have advanced the state of the art in dozens of technology fields."

Several of the group's current projects were demonstrated at last week's event, including new visualization technologies that will provide new ways to view the world, such as combining maps from Windows Live with other maps; new streaming intelligence technologies that combine Web services, machine learning, and sensors to help mobile devices make useful predictions; and surface computing technologies that do away with the mouse and monitor and allow images and data to be displayed practically anywhere, and allow them to be manipulated with hand gestures.

Freedom to pursue practically any new computer-related research project has been a hallmark of those 15 years, says Microsoft Research senior vice president, Rick Rashid. "I'm extremely proud that Microsoft has given our researchers unwavering support to relentlessly pursue virtually any realm of computing with no boundaries but the limits of their imaginations," he says.