This week Microsoft announced they will be discontinuing their Internet browser Windows Explorer. The current browser will be replaced when they release the new Windows 10 operating system. Despite developing a new browser the company claims Internet Explorer will still be available for a while before it is removed from their products. The new browser has not been officially been named and is currently going under the working title ‘Project Spartan’. This next generation browser has also not been given an official release date yet.
Internet Explorer, is now included as part of Microsoft Windows was launched in 1995. Between 2002 and 2003, Microsoft Internet Explorer hit a browser marketshare of about 95%. Due to different Internet browsers entering the market, that number has changed over the years. This Net Applications report states that Internet Explorer’s marketshare now sits at slightly more than 57%. Competitor’s Mozilla Firefox launched in 2002 and has a marketshare of over 12%. Google Chrome launched in 2008 and now has more than 20% marketshare.
This announcement was made as part of the Microsoft Convergence festival in Atlanta this week. The opening keynote address was made by CEO Satya Nadella and Kirill Tatarinov, Executive VP, Microsoft Business Solutions and can be viewed on the conference website.
The only constant is change, especially in the world of technology. Last week we wrote about how the Windows operating system XP has been out of product support since April last year. With this week’s announcement it will be interesting to see how the changes to the new browser will affects Microsoft’s market share. Internet Explorer had a run of 20 years, a long time for a product life cycle. How those changes will affect millions of Windows users remains to be seen.
Best
David Bower
CEO
Neo Technologies
thefuture@neo.majorcreative.com.au
