Category: Microsoft news

Microsoft news, features, events, and press materials

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Microsoft announces early participation results of exchange offers

REDMOND, Wash. — May 14, 2020 — Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) (“Microsoft”) announced today the early participation results of its offers to (i) exchange (the “Pool 1 Offer”) the ten series of notes described in the table below (collectively, the “Pool 1 Notes”) for a new series of Microsoft’s notes due June 1, 2050 (the “New 2050 Notes”) and a cash payment, as applicable:

Pool 1 Table
Title of Security CUSIP
Number		 Principal Amount
Outstanding		 Acceptance Priority
Level		 Principal
Amount Tendered (1)
4.875% Notes due 2043 594918AX2 $500,000,000 1 $316,270,000
5.300% Notes due 2041 594918AM6 $1,000,000,000 2 $224,322,000
4.450% Notes due 2045 594918BL7 $3,000,000,000 3 $1,774,667,000
4.250% Notes due 2047 594918CA0 $3,000,000,000 4 $1,443,710,000
5.200% Notes due 2039 594918AD6 $750,000,000 5 $191,415,000
4.500% Notes due 2040 594918AJ3 $1,000,000,000 6 $427,782,000
3.750% Notes due 2043 594918AU8 $500,000,000 7 $252,918,000
3.750% Notes due 2045 594918BD5 $1,750,000,000 8 $1,106,308,000
4.100% Notes due 2037 594918BZ6 $2,500,000,000 9 $1,568,040,000
4.200% Notes due 2035 594918BK9 $1,000,000,000 10 $324,503,000

 

  1. The aggregate principal amounts of each series that have been validly tendered for exchange and not validly withdrawn, as of 5:00 p.m., New York City time, on May 13, 2020 (the “Early Exchange Time”), based on information provided by the exchange agent to Microsoft.

and (ii) exchange (the “Pool 2 Offer” and, together with the Pool 1 Offer, the “Exchange Offers”) the four series of notes described in table below (collectively, the “Pool 2 Notes” and, together with the Pool 1 Notes, the “Existing Notes”) for a new series of Microsoft’s notes due June 1, 2060 (the “New 2060 Notes” and, together with the New 2050 Notes, the “New Notes”) and a cash payment, as applicable:

Pool 2 Table
Title of Security CUSIP
Number		 Principal Amount
Outstanding		 Acceptance Priority
Level		 Principal
Amount Tendered (1)
4.750% Notes due 2055 594918BM5 $1,000,000,000 1 $672,725,000
4.000% Notes due 2055 594918BE3 $2,250,000,000 2 $1,492,344,000
4.500% Notes due 2057 594918CB8 $2,000,000,000 3 $992,305,000
3.950% Notes due 2056 594918BU7 $2,250,000,000 4 $1,696,715,000
  1. The aggregate principal amounts of each series that have been validly tendered for exchange and not validly withdrawn, as of the Early Exchange Time, based on information provided by the exchange agent to Microsoft.

In the Exchange Offers, according to the information provided by D.F. King & Co., Inc., the information agent and exchange agent for the Exchange Offers, $7,629,935,000 in aggregate principal amount of the Pool 1 Notes and $4,854,089,000 in aggregate principal amount of the Pool 2 Notes were validly tendered and not validly withdrawn at or prior to the Early Exchange Time, as more fully set forth above.

Pricing for the Exchange Offers is expected to occur at 10:00 a.m., New York City time, on May 14, 2020. The Exchange Offers are scheduled to expire at 11:59 p.m., New York City time, on May 28, 2020, unless extended by Microsoft (such date and time, as they may be extended, the “Expiration Time”). The “Settlement Date” will be promptly following the Expiration Time and is expected to be June 1, 2020, which is the second business day following the Expiration Time.

A Registration Statement on Form S-4, including a prospectus (the “Prospectus”), which is subject to change, relating to the New Notes has been filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) on April 30, 2020 (the “Registration Statement”) but has not yet become effective. The New Notes may not be sold nor may offers to buy be accepted prior to the time the Registration Statement becomes effective. If and when issued, the New Notes will be registered under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended. This news release does not constitute an offer or a solicitation by Microsoft of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of securities in any state in which such offer or solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such state.

Consummation of the Exchange Offers is subject to a number of conditions as set forth in the Prospectus included in the Registration Statement, including, among other things, the Registration Statement of which the Prospectus forms a part having been declared effective by the SEC and remaining effective on the settlement date. The Exchange Offers are made only by and pursuant to the terms and subject to the conditions set forth in the Prospectus, which forms a part of the Registration Statement after it is declared effective by the SEC, and the information in this news release is qualified by reference to such Prospectus and the Registration Statement. None of Microsoft, the dealer managers, or the information agent and exchange agent makes any recommendations as to whether holders should tender their Existing Notes pursuant to the Exchange Offers. Holders must make their own decisions as to whether to tender Existing Notes and, if so, the principal amount of Existing Notes to tender.

Copies of the Prospectus, pursuant to which the Exchange Offers are being made, may be obtained from D.F. King & Co., Inc., the information agent and exchange agent for the Exchange Offers, at 212-269-5552 (to exchange), at 800-431-9645 (for information U.S. Toll-free), at 212-269-5550 (information for brokers), at www.dfking.com/microsoft, or at microsoft@dfking.com. Questions regarding the terms and conditions of the Exchange Offers should be directed to the following joint lead dealer managers:

BofA Securities

620 South Tryon Street, 20th Floor

Charlotte, NC 28255

Toll Free: (888) 292-0070

Collect: (980) 387-3907

Attn: Liability Management Group

 Deutsche Bank Securities Inc.

60 Wall Street

New York, NY 10005

Toll Free: (866) 627-0391

Collect: (212) 250-2955

Attn: Liability Management Group

In order to participate in any Exchange Offer, holders of the Existing Notes located or resident in Canada are required to complete, sign and submit to the exchange agent a Canadian Eligibility Form, which may be obtained from D.F. King & Co., Inc. contacts above, to confirm they satisfy applicable Canadian eligibility requirements and to provide certain additional information.

Any holder of the Existing Notes located in any Member State of the European Economic Area or in the United Kingdom that is a retain investor will not be able to participate in the Exchange Offers. For these purposes, a retain investor means a person who is one or more of the following: (i) a retail client as defined in point (11) of Article 4(1) of the EU Directive on Markets in Financial Instruments (2014/65/EU) (as amended, “MiFID II”); or (ii) a customer within the meaning of Directive (EU) 2016/97, where that customer would not qualify as a professional client as defined in point (10) of Article (4)(1) of MiFID II.

About Microsoft

Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT” @microsoft) enables digital transformation for the era of an intelligent cloud and an intelligent edge. Its mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.

Forward-Looking Statements

Statements in this news release are “forward-looking statements” based on current expectations and assumptions that are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results could differ materially because of factors described above as well as:

  • intense competition in all of our markets that may lead to lower revenue or operating margins;
  • increasing focus on cloud-based services presenting execution and competitive risks;
  • significant investments in products and services that may not achieve expected returns;
  • acquisitions, joint ventures, and strategic alliances that may have an adverse effect on our business;
  • impairment of goodwill or amortizable intangible assets causing a significant charge to earnings;
  • cyberattacks and security vulnerabilities that could lead to reduced revenue, increased costs, liability claims, or harm to our reputation or competitive position;
  • disclosure and misuse of personal data that could cause liability and harm to our reputation;
  • the possibility that we may not be able to protect information stored in our products and services from use by others;
  • abuse of our advertising or social platforms that may harm our reputation or user engagement;
  • the development of the internet of things presenting security, privacy, and execution risks;
  • issues about the use of artificial intelligence in our offerings that may result in competitive harm, legal liability, or reputational harm;
  • excessive outages, data losses, and disruptions of our online services if we fail to maintain an adequate operations infrastructure;
  • quality or supply problems;
  • the possibility that we may fail to protect our source code;
  • legal changes, our evolving business model, piracy, and other factors may decrease the value of our intellectual property;
  • claims that Microsoft has infringed the intellectual property rights of others;
  • claims against us that may result in adverse outcomes in legal disputes;
  • government litigation and regulatory activity relating to competition rules that may limit how we design and market our products;
  • potential liability under trade protection, anti-corruption, and other laws resulting from our global operations;
  • laws and regulations relating to the handling of personal data that may impede the adoption of our services or result in increased costs, legal claims, fines, or reputational damage;
  • additional tax liabilities;
  • damage to our reputation or our brands that may harm our business and operating results;
  • exposure to increased economic and operational uncertainties from operating a global business, including the effects of foreign currency exchange;
  • uncertainties relating to our business with government customers;
  • adverse economic or market conditions that may harm our business;
  • catastrophic events or geopolitical conditions, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, that may disrupt our business; and
  • the dependence of our business on our ability to attract and retain talented employees.

For more information about risks and uncertainties associated with Microsoft’s business, please refer to the “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations” and “Risk Factors” sections of Microsoft’s SEC filings, including, but not limited to, its annual report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q that are incorporated by reference in the Prospectus forming a part of the Registration Statement, copies of which may be obtained by contacting Microsoft’s Investor Relations department at (800) 285-7772 or at Microsoft’s Investor Relations website at http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/investor.

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Where’s my stuff? Developing AI with help from people who are blind or low vision

A photo of 10 images taken from a pilot study by people who are blind or low vision. Microsoft AI for Accessibility is funding the ORBIT research project, which is enlisting the help of people who are blind or low vision to build a new dataset. People who are blind or low vision can contribute to the project by providing videos of things found in their daily lives. The goal is to improve automatic object recognition to better identify specific personal items. The data will be used for training and testing Artificial Intelligence (AI) models that personalize object recognition. In contrast to previous research efforts, we will request videos rather than images from users who are blind or low vision, as they provide a richer set of information.

To help us with our research, we have conducted a pilot study to further investigate how to collect these videos, and we are currently recruiting users who are blind or low vision in the UK to record videos of things that are important to them. Visit the ORBIT dataset homepage for more information on the study and how to sign up.

To maintain privacy and confidentiality, users’ contributions to the pilot study, and to all future phases of this research, are anonymized and checked before being included in the dataset. Any videos containing information that could lead back to the identity of the users are removed.

Smartphones are really useful in making visual information accessible to people who are blind or low vision. For instance, the Seeing AI app allows you to take a picture of your surroundings in scene mode, and then it reads aloud what things are recognized in the picture (for example, “a person sitting on a sofa”). AI recognizes objects in a scene easily enough if they are commonly found. For now, however, these apps can’t tell you which of the things it recognizes is yours, and they don’t know about things that are particularly important to users who are blind or low vision. For example, has someone moved your keys again? Did your white cane get mixed up with someone else’s? Imagine being able to easily identify things that are important to you or being able to easily locate your personal stuff.

Apps like Seeing AI use artificial intelligence techniques in computer vision to recognize items. While AI is making great strides toward improving computer vision solutions for many applications, such as automated driving, there are still areas where it does not work so well—personalized object recognition is one such area. Previous research has started to make some advances to solving the problem by looking at how people who are blind or low vision take pictures, what algorithms could be used to personalize object recognition, and which kinds of data are best suited for enabling personalized object recognition.

However, research is currently held back by the lack of available data to use for training and then evaluating AI algorithms for personalized object recognition. Most datasets in computer vision comprise hundreds of thousands or millions of images. But at the moment, the datasets available for personal object recognition are from tens of users and contain maybe hundreds of images. In addition, there has been no effort to collect images of objects that may be particularly important to users who are blind or low vision. Providing a larger dataset for researchers and developers to use to build better AI systems could be a game changer in this area, for people who are blind or low vision in particular but also for everyone.

By funding the ORBIT project, Microsoft AI for Accessibility hopes to help researchers construct a large dataset from users who are blind or low vision, which will help further advance AI as it relates to personalizing object recognition. Researchers from City, University of London, Microsoft Research, and University of Oxford are collaborating in this effort. Collaborators include the authors of this blog post along with Katja Hofmann, Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research Cambridge, and Luisa Zintgraf, PhD student at the University of Oxford and Research Intern at Microsoft Research Cambridge.

Unlike previous research efforts, we will collect videos since they provide a richer set of information than images. Our research is also focused on providing realistic testing data so that any new algorithms can be rigorously evaluated. We anticipate that our dataset might be useful for implementations in existing apps, like Seeing AI, and also in novel wearable systems like Project Tokyo, but our team is keen to future-proof the dataset for new applications that are yet to be imagined. The dataset will be made publicly available for download in two phases: Phase 1 will include about 100 users and thousands of videos, while Phase 2 will gather data from about 1,000 users and contain more than 10,000 videos.

Figure 1: A word cloud showing the frequency of objects captured on video in the pilot study. The larger the word, the more often it occurred.

To help us with our research, we have conducted a pilot study to investigate how to collect these videos. During that pilot study, we gathered 193 videos from eight people who are blind or low vision, each of whom were asked to take videos of five different objects. For each object, we have videos in different settings in their home and using different filming techniques, some of which they were free to choose. We found that common items that were captured on video included users’ own white canes, keys, glasses, remote controls, bags, and headphones, many of which users wanted to identify and locate. The videos also included some rather surprising items, such as crisps (or chips to Americans). The quality of videos from the pilot study was good for machine learning purposes, revealing no serious issues due to lighting or items being out of frame.

This pilot dataset is available for public use while we develop the larger datasets. Initial investigations by researchers from Microsoft Research have shown that a convolutional neural network trained on Mini-ImageNet using 50 random frames drawn from the videos can reach accuracy of nearly 50%. A more sophisticated technique, which applies a frame-weighting mechanism supplemented with training on Meta-Dataset, can improve results by 10 percentage points.

The pilot also highlighted that collecting videos is tricky because it must be simultaneously easy for blind users to record them, and the data must be useful for machine learning. Instructions for users who are blind or low vision on how to take videos of objects are important—so that the AI can eventually identify the objects. This aspect presents an additional opportunity for users to learn more about how AI works. We’re currently at the beginning stages of developing a curriculum for users who want to educate themselves about AI, from a base-level understanding to some more advanced concepts like how AI is built.

The next step in our project is to gather video data for the first phase of our dataset release. To do this, we are recruiting users who are blind or low vision in the UK to record videos of things that are important to them. We have built an iPhone app, the ORBIT Camera, for gathering the videos, including guidance to users for how to film the things that they want to have recognized. For anyone interested in taking part, please visit the ORBIT dataset homepage for more information on the study and how to sign up. Later in the year, there will be another opportunity to contribute to our project for users who are blind or low vision worldwide.

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Celebrating the Garage Wall of Fame: a look back at 20 stellar projects with impact

In celebration of The Garage Wall of Fame reaching 20 Wall of Fame inductees, we are recapping highlights about each honoree and their achievements. Honorees have roots either as an experimental project released through the Microsoft Garage, or as projects from The Garage produced global Hackathon, the largest private hackathon in the world.

Read on to learn more about these incredible projects, and follow us on Twitter @MSFTGarage to catch new Wall of Fame announcements.

Wall of Fame inductees: 3D Models in Office, Azure Quickstart Center, Azure Resource Graph

3D Models in Office is a feature that enables users to easily insert 3D models into PowerPoint, Word, and Excel. The project brought 3D content into Office products with ability to resize, animate, rotate, and morph objects, and was featured as part of the Windows 10 Creators Update.

Azure Quickstart Center is a step-by-step guide built into Azure Portal that enables Azure customers to easily create, configure, and manage cloud workloads. Guidance includes set-up, start a project, and online courses to help customers deploy to the cloud with confidence and ease, improving customers’ onboarding experiences to Azure.

Azure Resource Graph is a service in Azure that gives enterprise businesses an efficient way to explore their Azure resources, analytics, and querying across subscriptions for large-scale environments. The project provides customers a clearer picture of their activity and environments across Azure for smarter and more efficient management of resources, saving time and money.

Wall of Fame inductees: Eye Control for Windows 10, FarmBeats, FindTime

Eye Control for Windows 10 is an eye-tracking technology that empowers people with disabilities to use a compatible eye-tracker to operate an on-screen mouse, keyboard and text-to-speech experience in Windows 10 using only their eyes. Eye Control worked with nonprofit Team Gleason as well as the ALS Association to make Windows 10 more accessible.

FarmBeats is an IOT solution that enables farmers to leverage real-time soil and climate data to optimize their harvest. Many weather apps present predictions that cover large areas that can vary greatly from a specific farm. This solution empowers farmers, especially those in emerging markets without access to inexpensive wifi to power solutions, with high precision analytics about their climate and farm conditions. Utilized by farmers in India to increase their harvest and grow their business.

FindTime is an Outlook add-in that gives users the easiest way to schedule meetings across companies without needing to see calendar availabilities. Over hundreds of thousands of professionals have utilized FindTime to quickly send meeting polls to streamline and automate scheduling, eliminating hours of emails back and forth.

Wall of Fame inductees: Microsoft Health Bot Service, Microsoft Kaizala, Microsoft Launcher

Microsoft Health Bot Service is a SaaS (Software as a Service) offering that enables enterprise developers in healthcare to build custom personal health assistants and chatbots. These AI-powered health agents empower patients, nurses, and doctors with self-serve capabilities, helping to improve services, processes, and outcomes while reducing costs.

Microsoft Kaizala is a mobile messaging app that enables large groups to communicate efficiently and facilitate work management both within and outside their organization. Kaizala helps millions of users worldwide including government entities, First Line Workers, business partners and customers stay connected securely as part of Office 365.

Microsoft Launcher is a launcher for Android that enables users with a Microsoft account to personalize Android devices with new home screens and enable cross-device experiences between phone and Windows PC. Microsoft Launcher became #1 launcher on the Android Play Store and celebrated 15 million installs.

Wall of Fame inductees: Microsoft Learning Tools, Mobile Sharing and Companion Experiences for Microsoft Teams Meetings, Mouse Without Borders

Microsoft Learning Tools are free tools built into Office 365 and Microsoft Edge applications that empower users to improve reading, writing, and comprehension skills. Microsoft Learning Tools captured the Grand Prize at Microsoft’s 2015 Hackathon. It helps students of all ages and abilities, is an essential tool for teachers and classrooms, and has earned 10million monthly active users.

Mobile Sharing and Companion Experiences for Microsoft Teams Meetings are features in Microsoft Teams that enables users and meeting participants to seamlessly use computer and phone devices together in meetings including cross-device screen sharing, mobile video, photos, and PowerPoint presentations. This project won the Business category in Microsoft’s 2015 Hackathon and was showcased at Build 2017, before being officially integrated into Microsoft Teams.

Mouse Without Borders is a free app for Windows that enables users to control up to four computers from a single mouse and keyboard. This project created by a single developer was one of the first Microsoft Garage experimental projects and has achieved millions of downloads, top press accolades, and continues to be widely popular in the developer community.

Wall of Fame inductees: New Data Types in Excel, Personal Shopping Assistant, Presentation Translator

New Data Types in Excel is an AI-powered feature recognizing data types beyond numbers and text strings that enables users to quickly retrieve relevant information from knowledge graphs based on context and directly populate cells or formulas. These new data types simplify the process of working with real-world data and enhances spreadsheets with richer content without needing to switch applications – relevant and contextual data can be injected directly into spreadsheets.

Personal Shopping Assistant is a browser plug-in that automatically identifies better deals for online shopping. The plug-in shows shoppers better deals and similar products when shopping. Shoppers can create boards of wish list products and the assistant will work for them in the background spotting deals.

Presentation Translator is an add-in for PowerPoint that allows presenters and audiences to display live subtitles in PowerPoint presentations with multi-language support. Presentation Translator is a vital resource for classrooms and people who are deaf or hard of hearing, helping audiences follow along with presentations and participate in discussions.

Wall of Fame inductees: Seeing AI, Sports Performance Platform, Video Indexer

Seeing AI is a free app that empowers the blind and low vision community to navigate their day by narrating the world around them. Users can read labels, understand emotions and more, powered by Cognitive Services baked into the app. Seeing AI helps Microsoft empower the blind and low vision community while illustrating how AI can augment human potential rather than replace it. Multiple honors including American Council of the Blind, American Foundation for the Blind’s Helen Keller Achievement Award, CES Asia, Mobile World Congress.

Sports Performance Platform is a cloud-based, sports analytics platform that enables athletes and coaches to examine player and team data to make data-driven, predictive decisions that improve performance and inform strategy. Sports science staff from Seattle Seahawks, and other sports organizations local and global, have used Sports Performance Platform to support athlete performance and help reduce injuries and time off the field.

Video Indexer is a cloud service that enables users to extract insights from their videos using AI technologies. Video Indexer makes possible new forms of content discovery based on metadata, such as searching for spoken words, face, and even emotions in videos. Apps can leverage this service to build engagement experiences with recommendations, highlight clips, and interactive videos.

Wall of Fame inductees: Watch For, Xbox Adaptive Controller

Watch For is an AI-powered computer vision system that enables livestreaming platforms and users to discover and analyze live video content, surfacing interesting parts of a livestream in real-time. This technology is what powers Mixer’s massively successful HypeZone channels and the livestream esports search results on Bing.

Xbox Adaptive Controller is an inclusive game controller that empowers everyone to play. The controller was named by TIME as a 2018 Invention of the Year in Accessibility.

Stay tuned to aka.ms/WallOfFame for more powerful projects that demonstrate what can be achieved with hackathons, experimentation, collaboration, and customer obsession. We announce new Wall of Fame honorees on Twitter @MSFTGarage.

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Halo 2: Anniversary now available for PC as part of Master Chief Collection

Summary

  • Halo 2: Anniversary is Available Now on PC as part of Halo: The Master Chief Collection with Xbox Game Pass for PC (Beta), on the Microsoft Store and Steam.
  • Halo 2: Anniversary is the the impeccably remastered edition of the original Halo 2 release alongside Halo: The Master Chief Collection on console in 2014.
  • The game on PC comes equipped with new features, optimizations, customizations and more built for the platform.

The last few months have been eventful for Halo fans on PC, as Halo: The Master Chief Collection released in December 2019 with Halo: Reach and Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary joining its younger sibling in the collection via a surprise release on March 3. The Halo fun continues as Halo 2: Anniversary releases today as the next installment in Halo: The Master Chief Collection with Xbox Game Pass, on the Microsoft Store and on Steam. 

The game that changed online multiplayer forever, Halo 2: Anniversary is the impeccably remastered edition of the original Halo 2 game released alongside Halo: The Master Chief Collection on console in 2014. Following the Chief’s victory in Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, experience the pivotal battle in the Human-Covenant war to defend Earth, where the Master Chief finds an unlikely ally on a new Halo ringworld and fights to prevent the destruction of humankind. Enjoy legendary multiplayer with seven remastered multiplayer maps from Halo 2: Anniversary and 25 multiplayer maps from the original Halo 2, as well as the ability to toggle between the remastered graphics in the Anniversary edition and the graphics from the original Halo 2 campaign. 

Halo 2: Anniversary on PC comes equipped with new features, optimizations, and customizations built for the platform. The game looks and plays better than ever at 60 frames-per-second (or greater) with 4K UHD support, and players can fine-tune their experience with a vast array of options, including customizable mouse and keyboard support, ultrawide support, FOV customization and more. 

Like all titles in Halo: The Master Chief Collection on PC, players will have a few different ways to experience Halo 2: Anniversary depending on their platform of choice: 

  • Xbox Game Pass – Join Xbox Game Pass Ultimate or Xbox Game Pass for PC (Beta) and get Halo 2: Anniversary, the next chapter in Halo: The Master Chief Collection. Halo 3, Halo 3: ODST (Campaign), and Halo 4 will also be included in your membership and will be available on each game’s respective release date, completing the collection in 2020. 
  • Microsoft Store and Steam – The Halo: The Master Chief Collection bundle is available today for $39.99 USD, which includes Halo: Reach and Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, and now Halo 2: Anniversary, plus the remaining titles as they launch next year. Halo 2: Anniversary can also be purchased individually for $9.99 USD. 

Thank you to Halo Insiders who’ve shared feedback and participated in hands-on testing of pre-release builds on our journey to bring Halo 2: Anniversary to Halo: The Master Chief Collection! The community’s support and involvement through public “flights” over the past several months has been critical to ensuring Halo 2: Anniversary offers the best experience possible. If you’re interested in joining the flighting process for future releases, sign up at HaloInsider.com.  

For all the latest on Halo 2: Anniversary, Halo: The Master Chief Collection and all things Halo, be sure to stay tuned to Halo Waypoint and Xbox Wire, and follow @Halo on your favorite social media platforms. 

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Sri Lanka’s tea industry moves to cloud-based auction system to avoid a devastating COVID-19 shutdown

Picking, sorting, processing, and grading tea leaves make up the fabric of life here. And ensuring that people around the globe get their daily cups of chai, Earl Grey, English Breakfast, or Orange Pekoe is crucial to the local economy and jobs.  

To maintain all the above, this multimillion-dollar industry relies on the Colombo Tea Auction – a weekly event that has been held in the national capital under rules and procedures largely unchanged since they were first laid down in the 1880s and 1890s.

Until now, putting lots of fine Ceylon tea under the hammer and up for export was a noisy and very physical affair. Bidding echoed in rapid-fire across the three theater-like auction rooms that were often packed with hundreds of brokers and officials, many of them jotting down numbers of paper sheets.

This ritual ended in mid-March, not because it was regarded as old-fashioned or inefficient, but as a matter of health and safety.

“When the COVID-19 pandemic hit our country, it was impossible for our traditional tea auction to follow social distancing and other health guidelines,” recalls Jayantha Edirisinghe, Sri Lanka’s Tea Commissioner.

The auction schedule was suspended for two weeks. With a potentially devastating economic shock looming, the Sri Lanka Tea Board and its Tea Traders Association turned to a local Microsoft partner, CICRA Solutions, to create a fast digital alternative that would also incorporate the spirit and ways of the old system.

The company had previously scored successes for the industry by automating its complex tea brokering practices and by modernizing the Tea Board’s back-office system. Now, with the pandemic worsening, the time had come for a digital transformation of the whole auction process.

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Microsoft and Redis Labs collaborate to give developers new Azure Cache for Redis capabilities

Now more than ever, enterprises must deliver their applications with speed and robustness that matches the high expectations of their customers. The ability to provide sub-millisecond response times, reliably support the demands of enterprises from small to large, and scale seamlessly to handle millions of requests per second are critical to modern application development. At the same time, technology solutions need to be more open and flexible to handle cloud native architectures while maintaining mission-critical uptime and reliability.

Microsoft and Redis Labs partnering to bring new features to Azure Cache for Redis

With this in mind, I am announcing a new partnership between Microsoft and Redis Labs to bring their industry-leading technology and expertise to Azure Cache for Redis. This partnership represents the first native integration between Redis Labs technology and a major cloud platform, underscoring our commitment to customer choice and flexibility.

For years, developers have utilized the speed and throughput of Redis to produce unbeatable responsiveness and scale in their applications. We’ve seen tremendous adoption of Azure Cache for Redis, our managed solution built on open source Redis, as Azure customers have leveraged Redis performance as a distributed cache, session store, and message broker. The incorporation of the Redis Labs Redis Enterprise technology extends the range of use cases in which developers can utilize Redis, while providing enhanced operational resiliency and security.

Redis integration designed for enterprise customers

With this partnership, we worked together with Redis to build a new expanded offering powered by Redis Labs technologies aimed specifically at the needs of enterprise customers. With the integration of Redis Labs technology with Azure Cache for Redis, customers can now access Redis Labs-developed modules including, RediSearch, RedisBloom, and RedisTimeSeries, which provide new data structures that will further enable use cases like data analytics and machine learning.

These modules will be paired with existing features of Azure Cache for Redis including data persistence, clustering, geo-replication, and network isolation. Customers will also now have the option to deploy on SSD flash storage, offering up to ten times larger cache sizes and similar performance levels at a lower price per GB. Reliability will be an even greater priority with an enhanced SLA and the capability to utilize active geo-replication to configure a globally available cache that can fail over to another region without any data loss. In the future, this capability will make it possible to connect on-premise caches with caches in Azure for availability and failover.

Native Azure management creates streamlined experience for developers

While the new service is managed natively in Azure as two new Enterprise tiers, customers will subscribe to the Redis Labs software through Azure Marketplace as an integral part of the configuration process. This unique integration provides all the benefits of using a service embedded in Azure, including management through the Azure portal and command-lines, security and standards compliance, and a unified billing experience.

Microsoft will handle first-line support and collaborate with Redis Labs on specific support issues to utilize their deep knowledge of the technology. As a native offering, developer teams will now find it significantly easier to integrate Redis Enterprise functionality into their Azure development efforts by taking advantage of the security, configuration, and support tools they are already familiar with. Plus, developers can enable these new features with no downtime or change in billing management.

We are thrilled to be expanding our relationship with Redis Labs and continuing our collaboration with the Redis open source community. Together, we will unlock the potential of Redis and enable enterprises to build applications that are more responsive and scalable than ever before with tools that developers love.

Learn more

For more information on the Redis Labs partnership, you can read the blog post from Redis Labs CEO, Ofer Bengal. Additional product information is also available on the Redis Labs blog. The initial announcement was made at RedisConf 2020 Takeaway. Preview for this new offering will be available later this year. Sign up to be notified when the preview is available.

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New Microsoft Family Safety app now available in preview for iOS and Android

In March, we announced Microsoft Family Safety—a new app to help you protect what matters most with digital and physical safety. Today, we are excited to start rolling out the launch of limited preview of the app on iOS and Android.

a family on a couch, one child holding a laptop

With families working and learning from home, many of us are spending more time on our computers and phones and are looking for ways to ensure our loved ones are safe. Microsoft Family Safety helps you to facilitate a dialogue with your kids about the time they are spending on their devices and type of content they are viewing. The app provides transparency on where everyone is spending time online and allows you to create flexible schedules to carve out more time for things like online learning. Additionally, it helps you stay connected even when you’re apart with location sharing. Our team is committed to bringing you additional physical safety features in the coming months, like safe driving, so as we go back to a new normal you can help protect your family across your whole life.

Find the balance that is right for your family. Give your kids independence to learn and explore, while setting boundaries that help them make good choices. Kids can see the same activity reports their parents see, so everyone can be part of the conversation. Additionally, with Microsoft Family Safety, family members can manage their data and information and who it is shared with. We work around the clock to help protect your information and will not sell your data.

Let’s take a closer look as some of the features you can try in the preview of Family Safety:

Develop healthy digital habits: Activity reporting

Get information about your family’s activity so you can have a conversation about what your kids are doing online and on their devices. View screen time, top websites visited, and terms kids are searching for online.2,3 Receive an email summary each week to help facilitate a dialogue on healthy digital choices and begin developing good habits from a young age.

activity reporting in the Microsoft Family Safety app

Find screen time balance: Screen time limits

Set screen time limits across Windows and Xbox devices. Or if your kids will be on devices longer for things like online learning, you can set limits on specific apps or games instead.2 Now when you say only one hour of a certain game, that really means one hour of that game—whether that’s being played on a Windows PC, Xbox, or Android phone. And if they run out of screen time, they can ask for more. You have the choice to add more time or not based on what is right for your family.

screen time limits in the Microsoft Family Safety app

Choose the right content: Content controls

Create a safe space for your kids to explore online. Set healthy boundaries with web and search filters to block mature content and set browsing to kid-friendly websites on Microsoft Edge.3 Get notified when your kids want to download a more mature app or game from the Microsoft Stores with age limits, keeping you in the know and helping to avoid surprises.5 Family Safety provides you with the tools to begin talking about the type of content that is right for your kids.

content controls in the Microsoft Family Safety app

Locate your loved ones: Location sharing

Stay connected even when you’re apart. See loved ones on a map with location sharing.4 Plus, save places they visit the most, like home, work, or school, to know where family members are at glance. With stay-at-home orders and restrictions on mobility currently in place, it is important to know where your loved ones are when they are not at home—for example if your teenager got side-tracked while running to the grocery store and ended up at a friend’s house. And as we get back to a new normal, keeping in touch with your loved ones will be even more important.

location sharing in the Microsoft Family Safety app

We invite you to join the preview today so that we can gather your feedback and continue enhancing the experience before launching in the coming months. Once launched, the app will be available to download for free in the app stores.

Here’s how to join the preview:

For users, who have already expressed interest, we will be reaching out with instructions to download the preview.

We have limited availability for additional users on Android and iOS and invite you to sign up. As a participant in the preview, you gain early access to the app and get to help shape the product by sharing feedback about your experience.

Microsoft Family Safety is best when used together. We are looking for families with children of all ages to join the preview. We ask that users participating in the preview actively provide feedback to help us learn from your experience. You can send feedback in the app by shaking your device or tapping on the menu > Help and feedback.

Get the preview.

From our family to yours, we couldn’t be more excited to help you protect what matters most.

1 Currently in preview, available to a limited number of users on iOS and Android.
2 Windows, Xbox, and Android apps and games only.
3 Enables SafeSearch with Microsoft Edge on Windows 10 and Xbox One devices only.
4 Location permissions must be active.
5 Applies to apps downloaded from the Xbox and Microsoft stores.

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Join Microsoft and industry leaders for an AI virtual summit on June 2

Now more than ever, artificial intelligence is proving its value in helping businesses across sectors address and adjust to massive change, disruption and unpredictability.  

On June 2, Microsoft will host an AI virtual summit to bring together industry leaders and experts to discuss the benefits of putting AI into action. 

During the event, you’ll hear how business leaders are using AI to respond to and recover from recent challenges, as well as examples of game-changing solutions to problems spanning business, government, education and other areas.  

Mitra Azizirad, Corporate Vice President of AI & Innovation at Microsoft, will kick off the event with a keynote on the value of creating an AI-powered organization. 

Register here to attend Imagining the Future: Microsoft AI Virtual Summit, where you’ll learn: 

  • What it takes to become an AI-powered organization; 
  • The power of AI for manufacturing and supply chains; 
  • How AI is advancing health and medical services; 
  • Microsoft’s approach to responsible, inclusive, trusted AI; and 
  • How enterprises can focus on immediate requirements while creating their own AI futures. 

View a full agenda or register for the event. You can also join Microsoft on LinkedIn on June 2 at 9 am PT to view the livestream of Mitra Azizirad’s keynote. 

 

 

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How Microsoft customers and partners in Europe are bringing health care home

In recent weeks, the world has been on a steep learning curve when it comes to remote health care. What can we learn from those who have been managing patients remotely for some time?

For the one-third of Europeans living with a chronic illness, frequent trips to the doctor are simply a part of daily life. Improving the management of these and other conditions outside hospitals and clinics can have a significant positive impact on national health budgets, health care professionals’ schedules and patients’ overall wellbeing – helping them to live better, not just longer.

To this end, Microsoft customers and partners across Europe are developing remote health care solutions that allow patients to manage conditions from the comfort of their own homes, while still staying in close contact with health care providers.

From hospital room to living room

In Finland, nephrologist Dr. Virpi Rauta is leading Helsinki University Hospital’s (HUS) efforts to enable patients with chronic kidney diseases to undergo life-saving dialysis treatment at home, rather than having to travel to the hospital on average three times per week. This reduces the cost of health care delivery, but also improves patient safety and quality of life. One-third of all her patients now have their dialysis treatment at home, but Dr. Rauta would like to see this share increase.

A man connects his dialysis catheter at home
(Photo by Jakovo/iStock/Getty Images Plus)

“Before they reach the stage of needing dialysis, chronic kidney disease patients typically progress slowly, within months,” she says. “This ‘pre-dialysis’ phase is when we need to be educating them about their specific options. By analyzing patient data, we can start to predict this group’s risk factors – and better advise on the right course of treatment.”

Dr. Rauta’s project aims to identify patients suitable for home dialysis at an early stage and remotely monitor current patients. The data is then analyzed using Microsoft Azure cloud services, generating actionable insights that doctors can use to tweak and tailor treatment plans as needed. The project is part of a wider HUS CleverHealth Network initiative to produce artificial intelligence (AI) assisted solutions for early disease detection, automated diagnostics and treatment selection, and comprehensive home care.

Dr. Rauta explains why this is so valuable: “The more patients undergo dialysis at home, the less we see them in hospital. This is good, but it does mean that I might only see some patients twice a year – and I know very little about what happens in between appointments. Remote monitoring and data analysis can bridge that gap and ensure treatment stays on track.”

While patients with chronic kidney disease are typically in their 50s or 60s, this isn’t the only age range for which technology is generating new insights for remote disease management.

Obstetrician and gynecologist Dr. Saila Koivusalo leads another CleverHealth Network project at HUS, this time focused on improving the management of gestational diabetes. To improve the treatment and monitoring of these patients, the team has been developing an application to measure, monitor and analyze a mother’s key health indicators, such as glucose levels, physical activity, nutrition, stress, sleep and weekly weight. This data is stored and analyzed using Microsoft Azure cloud technology.

A pregnant woman talks to a health care professional using a digital tablet
(Photo by FatCamera/E+/Getty Images)

By tracking expectant mothers’ health at a granular level, Dr. Koivusalo can ensure women get the right guidance at the right time. “Very often, women experiencing gestational diabetes feel alone in dealing with their condition because, while they get good guidance, they usually get it too late,” she says. “If we can contact expectant mothers earlier, we can ensure everyone receives the same standard of care.”

Dr. Koivusalo warns that experiencing diabetes in pregnancy can increase both the mother and baby’s risk of developing chronic diabetes in future, so addressing it early is critical. While this project is still in a pilot phase, Dr. Koivusalo sees its potential for supporting at-risk women at all stages of pregnancy – from when they are simply planning, through to postnatal care and follow-up.

Starting at the heart

The maxim “prevention is better than cure” has also been adopted by Portugal’s Cova da Beira Hospital Center, which is using a cloud-based health tracking solution developed by Microsoft partner HopeCare to monitor patients at risk of heart failure.

Chronic heart failure affects 380,000 people across Portugal and is the leading cause of hospitalization among those aged 65 or over. This has increased by 33% in the last decade. Hospital admissions are mostly caused by a sudden worsening of heart failure symptoms such as breathing difficulties, swollen legs or fatigue. Such incidents, known as decompensation attacks, are scary – but they can be predicted and sometimes even prevented through close and regular health monitoring.

To this end, Cova da Beira has been trailing the use of HCAlert, a remote monitoring tool that collects, stores and analyzes patient data related to body temperature, blood oxygen level (SaO2), blood pressure, heart rate, weight and activity, in the Microsoft Azure cloud. A triage algorithm enables clinicians to identify which data points are most relevant and flags up any vital parameters that are not aligned with plans for the patient in question.

Since the solution was launched, clinical teams have seen a significant drop in hospital admissions (-62%), overall length of hospital stays (-48%), mortality rate (-42%) and emergency room visits (-85%), among the pilot patient groups. Most importantly however, both doctors and patients feel supported.

“It’s good to feel accompanied by someone at all times – I know I’m being monitored and if anything is out of the ordinary, a nurse calls me to check in,” says Alberto Galvão, a 74-year-old who has an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD).

From a clinical perspective, cardiologist Luis Oliveira describes how remote monitoring supports his work: “If it’s something simple, I can call the patient, ask how they are feeling and suggest an adjustment to the treatment if needed. Whereas if the data suggests that it may be something more serious, we’ll tell the patient to come straight to the hospital.”

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New Yammer now in public preview

Yammer connects people across departments and across the organization, enabling you to build communities, share knowledge and engage employees. At Microsoft Ignite, we announced an entirely redesigned Yammer experience, with new capabilities and integrations that drive employee engagement throughout Microsoft 365. Now, the new Yammer is available to organizations in public preview. Here’s a quick look at what’s new and how to get access to the new Yammer.

New Yammer Preview.png

What’s new

Yammer powers leadership engagement, corporate communications and knowledge sharing in Microsoft 365. Here are some of the new capabilities we’re introducing to make communities and conversations more impactful:

Build communities with Microsoft 365

  • To better convey the purpose of Yammer, groups are now called communities
  • Pin your favorite communities to the navigation for quick access.
  • Add cover photos to your communities
  • Report conversations to better moderate your communities.

Reach your audience across the organization

  • Bring Yammer communities and conversations into Outlook, Microsoft Teams, and SharePoint
  • Customize the All Company community cover photo and avatar
  • Brand Yammer with your company logo on the Feed

Add a custom cover photo, avatar, and name to your All CompanyAdd a custom cover photo, avatar, and name to your All Company

Empower anyone to be a communicator

  • Set questions, polls, and praise as announcements
  • Keep employees up to date with conversations that show up across Microsoft 365
  • Pin important posts to the top of your communities
  • Respond to Yammer conversations directly from Outlook on the web
  • Close conversations that have come to a conclusion
  • New editor experience provides new sharing options
  • Easily share files with the enhanced file picker that now includes recently used files
  • Polls, praise, and questions have new designs to stand out in the feed and drive engagement

Improved live events and video experience

  • Find and watch past, current, and upcoming live events on the Events page in each community
  • Produce live events using your webcam and screen sharing
  • Host live events in the All Company community
  • Create compelling video content with new video capture capabilities in the Yammer mobile app. Now you can quickly capture, edit, share and have vibrant conversations about those videos.

Engage with Q&A in live events across devicesEngage with Q&A in live events across devices

Discover and share across your network

  • Enhanced AI-powered feed shows you relevant conversations, people and topics you follow
  • Filter conversations to find unanswered questions and open conversations
  • Yammer’s suite bar now includes search and notifications, reflecting the experience across all Microsoft 365 apps.
  • User profiles are now unified with Azure AD profiles using profile cards to surface profile information throughout Yammer.

The Feed showing company branding and a variety of conversations in their new stylingThe Feed showing company branding and a variety of conversations in their new styling

There are even more new features and integrations coming to Yammer as we approach general availability, such as suggested communities, bookmarks, and additional admin and user controls.  We will update this article as we launch new features and post on the Admin Message Center whenever we have any major announcements.   

Enable the preview within your organization

Microsoft 365 Global Admins can configure access to the new Yammer preview through the Yammer admin portal. Admins can enable the preview toggle in the suite header and choose the default experience for their network: classic Yammer the new Yammer. Learn more about enabling the new Yammer preview for your organization.

YammerToggle.png

Once enabled by an admin, users will access the new Yammer or switch back to classic using the toggle in the navigation bar.

Who can access the new experience?

Once enabled by a Microsoft 365 Global Admin, people in your organization will be able to view the toggle to opt-in to the new experience. This will be available for canonical (home) networks only. You will still see the classic Yammer experience in external networks. If your organization wants to remove all access to the new Yammer during the preview phase, you will need to contact Microsoft support. 

Other ways to access the new Yammer

The new Yammer is available worldwide on mobile, for iOS and Android. The new Yammer app for Teams lets you stay connected to company communications, live events and communities inside the hub for teamwork. And in Outlook on the web, you can now engage with Yammer conversations directly from your Outlook inbox. Soon, we’ll be bringing inbox integration to Outlook desktop and mobile apps, and we’ll bring the new Yammer experience to SharePoint, with an updated web part.

How should I submit feature requests and feedback?

Feature requests and feedback on the product during preview should be submitted through the in-product feedback dialog boxes. Feedback can also be provided with peers through the new Yammer preview community on the Microsoft Tech Community.

  

FAQ

Q: When will the new Yammer come out of preview and be generally available?

A: We are continuing to test and improve the new Yammer to ensure it delivers the experience our customers expect. We are currently targeting worldwide availability in July.

Q: Can we opt out of the preview at any time?  

A: You can remove the preview toggle for your entire network through the new Yammer preview setting in the Yammer admin portal. Any users who have selected the new Yammer experience will remain in that experience until they choose to go back to the classic experience.  For more information about the available options, see opt-in settings.

Q: Do SLAs apply to the new Yammer preview?  

A: The Service Level Agreement for Microsoft Online Services does not apply to this preview.

Q: How do I open a support case?  

A: Please see the help page in the for general information. Your organization may have specific guidance for opening support cases, so you may need to talk with your IT team.  

Q: Is the new experience available for customers that have Yammer networks with data stored in the EU geo?  

A: Yes!   

  

Q: We have Yammer embedded in various places in our Intranet (i.e. Yammer tab in Microsoft Teams, Yammer web part for SharePoint, Yammer embed). How will those be impacted by the new Yammer?  

A: Initially there will not be any change to these experiences. Eventually, these experiences will have the same design as the new Yammer.   

  

Q: What about guest users in external groups?  

A: Users will see the new Yammer or the classic Yammer experience depending on the state of their home network. If your network hosts an external group, people within your network that are opted-in to the new experience in their home network will see that group in the new Yammer experience. Any guest users within the external group will see the classic Yammer experience if their network is not yet enabled for the new experience.   

  

Q: What about external networks?  

A: Users can continue to access external networks using the Network Switcher icon available on the integrated tool bar at the top of every page. On switching, users will see these external networks in the classic experience.  

Q: Are all languages supported in the new Yammer?  

 A: All languages available in classic Yammer are available in the public preview. 

Q: Can users get to the new Yammer preview without administrator changes? 

 A: Your Microsoft 365 admin controls whether users see the toggle to switch to the new Yammer experience. But users will always be able to access web.yammer.com while the new Yammer is in the public preview phase. If your organization wants to remove all access to the new Yammer during the preview phase, you will need to contact Microsoft support. More details on this can be found here. 

Q: I don’t want to enable the next experience for my production Yammer network yet. How can I test out the new toggle? 

A: You can try out the opt-in toggles in your test tenant. If you don’t have a test environment, create a new trial tenant for testing and enable the toggle there. 

-Murali Sitaram

Murali is the General Manager for Yammer and Microsoft 365 Groups