Vista in 2007: Microsoft delays an OS, postpones an industry
Redmond (WA) - The official reason being given by Microsoft for the delay of broad availability of Windows Vista until 2007, as presented late yesterday by outgoing co-president Jim Allchin, is this: Quality concerns, some of which apparently concerned system security, that turned up during product testing, prompted Microsoft to push its release date from October to November. But certain Microsoft partners - some of them PC manufacturers, plus some smaller OEMs, perhaps supporting equipment manufacturers, and some retailers, but none of them named - requested that if Microsoft were going to delay until November anyway, it might as well push forward into January. The reason given was apparently that it's difficult to launch, promote, and ship new products so close to the holidays.
"Our industry partners, as you probably know, during the December [selling] season, need quite a bit of time, and an extremely high level of confidence and certainty about that period of time," Allchin told analysts in a conference call yesterday. "Now, we've been in discussions with them, and in order for all the industry to be ready, instead of just part of the industry, we've decided to prioritize around the customer and partner satisfaction for the broad availability, to be in January of 2007. This will ensure great out-of-the-box experience for Windows Vista customers, and ensure that all of our partners are prepared at the same time."
That is the official line, more or less, from Microsoft. The scope of the delay, as Allchin framed it yesterday, is merely a few weeks. Let's take a good look at which few weeks those are. Just a few weeks ago, with the company holding true to "the second half of this year" as its release window, indications from Microsoft and its partners began centering around late September at the earliest. This would have given Microsoft and its partners optimal time to ramp up a promotional program, though October would probably also have been fine. November, as we've reported before with regard to a completely different product, is cutting it close, but not so close as to completely obliterate PC sales for the holidays.
Allchin sees no reason to expect PC sales forecasts for the year to change. You can read that last sentence over again; I promise you it is not in error. Allchin stated yesterday that Microsoft was asked to make this delay by the very PC manufacturers whose sales figures are bound to be hurt. "To be clear, the reason why we're doing this is because they asked us to do this. To be clear, some would like for us to continue, and some wouldn't. So what we're trying to do is think about the whole industry, and we don't see any plan in change in terms of PC forecast."
Yesterday, the euphemisms were flying, and the time machine was engaged in overdrive as a time period that's basically a shift from the second half of one year to the first half of the next one - a minimum of six months - was shaved down by multiple characterizations to two or three weeks, tops. "We needed just a few more weeks, and that puts us in what we would call a 'bubble' where some partners would be impacted more than others, and we decided to optimize it for the entire industry. So because of the industry logistics, we needed a few more weeks...to make [Vista] available in two stages: one for business and one for consumers, one in November and one in January."
If you look at the delay even more closely, from Microsoft's internal perspective, Allchin says it isn't even really a delay. "Obviously, we're still shipping Windows Vista in our next fiscal year," he told analysts, "so from our perspective, we're not changing anything about what our anticipation is next year."
Perhaps you're wondering too, just what sort of manufacturer would request that Microsoft jettison the otherwise all-important holiday selling season? A Dell spokesperson declined comment on that question to TG Daily today, other than to say that the company looks forward to Vista, and that "Dell believes Microsoft Windows Vista will help redefine personal computing for the next generation of users." (The current generation may be stuck with Windows XP for awhile.)
But HP, an executive of which was quoted in Microsoft's delay statement yesterday, offered a longer and more detailed response to our inquiry. "As Microsoft is one of HP's most valued and trusted partners," said the HP spokesperson, "we fully support them in determining the most appropriate schedule for the Windows Vista launch. We will continue to work together closely to ensure that we jointly deliver to customers the best total technology experience available, and look forward to focusing on an exciting post-holiday launch of the new operating system. And of course, we are continuing our plans to support Windows Vista across our consumer and business product lines."
If HP truly is working with Microsoft in the scheduling department, then the fact that HP is 1) honing up to that fact, and 2) not complaining about circumstances, may make that company a candidate for one of Allchin's mystery companies.
Won't the delay basically destroy PC sales for the remainder of the year, though, including for HP, as consumers wait until they can purchase something they can see? In its response, HP didn't exactly say no: "Holiday is usually our strongest season, and we still expect it to be so, but it's a bit too early for us to share any detail on specific offerings or upgrade plans for those products," the spokesperson told TG Daily. But, with more than 90 percent of our consumer PC portfolio qualifying as "Vista Capable," customers concerned with future compatibility with the new operating system will be able to purchase with confidence that their HP system will continue to serve them well as they look to move to Vista and other system upgrades of their choice.
