Microsoft has shelved Windows 10X, it’s Chrome OS competitor. The company is instead focusing its efforts on improving Windows 10 instead. Windows 10X will no longer ship this year, and likely will never arrive in its current form.
While I’m on the Microsoft beat, the company has also announced a pledge for EU commercial customers – they can store and process their data within the EU by 2022. This is generally believed to be in response to the EU ruling Privacy Shield invalid, which allowed EU-US data transfers.
With Chromebooks showing the kind of growth they have, Microsoft abandoning their 10X strategy leaves an unanswered question on how they will compete. Layer on the changing chip landscape, with Apple and their M1 and ARM chips in Chromebooks… how will Microsoft compete with endpoints?
EU regulation is driving business behavior – Microsoft is moving data to the EU for customers there. Think regulation doesn’t work – sure it does.