Microsoft Israel center ends cloud project, keeps employees

Microsoft Israel's R&D center recently completed work on the Windows Phone 7, a new cell phone operating system.

Sources inform ''Globes'' that 110 employees working on telecommunications at Microsoft Israel Ltd. were notified in the past couple of days that that their flagship project in cloud computing is being shut down. The project was in the incubation (pre-product) stage. Microsoft Israel confirmed the report.

Microsoft Israel's R&D center has 660 employees. The center concurrently runs 10-12 projects in a range of fields, especially security, telecommunications, mobility, and cloud computing services.

The cloud computing project employees will not be fired, but will be transferred to other projects that the R&D center will soon launch. The employees are considered high quality and the company does not want to lose them.

The sources added that Microsoft Israel's R&D center recently completed work on Windows Phone 7, a new cell phone operating system. The R&D center has never officially confirmed the existence of this unit, which employs 20 people.

In the past few weeks, Microsoft Corporation (Nasdaq: MSFT) has held worldwide launches of its new mobile operating system, and began sales in Europe two weeks ago. US sales will begin next week. Although the Israeli R&D center was a partner in this operating system, Microsoft has not yet launched a Hebrew language version of it.

Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 3, 2010

© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2010

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