The Microsoft Venture name was assumed from an existing team within our Developer Evangelism team. That team has now been rebranded to Microsoft Accelerator. Microsoft Ventures will focus on start-up investments while Microsoft Accelerator will focus on start-up enablement, primarily through our seven accelerators around the world.
On one side of the spectrum, we help early stage companies with tools, technology and consulting through Microsoft Accelerator*. And at the other end is where you’ll typically see our larger investments and acquisitions. Microsoft Ventures now fills a gap we’ve had somewhere in the middle of that range- he added.
In Microsoft’s history of engaging with and supporting start-ups, we’ve done a lot of investing, but not a lot of early stage. Because we would often invest alongside commercial deals, we were not a part of the early industry conversations on disruptive technology trends.
Microsoft will target cities like SF/Bay area, Seattle, New York City and Tel Aviv and other geographies in the coming years.
We’re not aiming to hit a specific number of investments annually, but you should expect steady activity over the course of the year in the areas I outlined.In the coming days and weeks ahead and beyond, you will see us showing up as an investor in companies that complement these spaces and those that aim to disrupt how business is done today – Nagraj Said.
Our focus is on the inorganic growth of Microsoft, looking at where we can provide a step function, versus incremental progress.
Microsoft will help early stage companies take advantage of Microsoft’s financial, technical and GTM resources.
Microsoft investment will focus mostly on cloud companies. Companies developing product and services that complement Azure infrastructure, building new business SaaS applications, promoting more personal computing by enriching the Windows and HoloLens ecosystems, new disruptive enterprise, consumer productivity, and communication products around Office 365 are interesting areas from an investment perspective.
In addition, Microsoft will invest in companies who are doing work in the areas for machine learning and security.