Zubin-Chagpar-Business-Group-Leader-Modern-Works-&-Security-Microsoft-Middle-East-and-Africa
I had the opportunity to meet Zubin Chagpar – Business Group Leader Modern Works & Security Microsoft Middle East and Africa at Redington’s Distributor meeting regarding the launch of Microsoft Surface products.
Q – Can you tell us more about the launch?
- First of all, thanks for taking the time to be with us as we talk about the launch of our new products. For surface. My name, again is Zubin Chagpar. And I’m the business group lead for modern work. So these are all the solutions you use in terms of Windows, Office teams and some of our future solutions, like looking into the future because we’re available today, like viva, which is productivity Suites. And this is also our exciting area around frontline workers, enabling them to enjoy the technologies and keep secure. And then, of course, our virtualization solutions. And then I look after cybersecurity as well, too. So this is the way to keep our customers secure as well, too. This includes the areas I just mentioned, plus on the Azure side as well. And then the Surface devices. So these are all hardware we work with through our partners to get to our customers so they can have the best experience and use technology to enable what they’re trying to do.
Q- Okay, great. Tell me when you talk about technology, there’s a major trend of measures that seem to be used compared to what happened in COVID time, there was an increase in sales of technology products, because of the hybrid format. That’s why presumed the product-like surface has become useful for customers and people who are using and can work from an office. So do you see your sales increase in 2023? Or do you see any changes in the current trend?
- What I can say that is we are seeing that more organizations have accelerated their technology transformation and their adoption of leading technologies as a differentiator. One because they want to lead in their markets. And this is what we love doing with our customers helping them lead in their markets, but to your point because their employees are working in different ways than they were before COVID, particularly from an information worker standpoint. So think about the average information worker, they’re balancing priorities at home, they’re balancing priorities at work, they often come into the office, and they often work from home as well, too. And that experience needs to be seamless. So that’s why we’re seeing an increase in the adoption of technologies, both from a hardware and software standpoint. And from a hardware standpoint, that’s becoming because they’re looking for form factors that make sense, whether it’s a Tablet or a device that can work in a more multitasking sort of way. They’re also looking for secured devices as well, too. And Microsoft, we have a concept of zero trust, which means trust no device, and make sure that every device is authenticated and authorized when they come into the environment. So this means that right at the point of identity, you need strong devices. So how this applies in terms of the surface means that when you’re looking to get authenticated, we do that at the identity point. And we look at the person through it, we work with the organization to look at it from what they have, which is you, which is your face. So the new authentication, you don’t need a password, if you lose your password, it won’t matter because you have that authenticated through the rest. And then if you need to authorize for some other reason, you can do multi-factor authentication as well, too. So this reduces one of the vulnerability points for an organization. So companies today are looking to leverage technology from a hardware standpoint, from that perspective. And then from software, it’s productivity, you need to be able to work and what a waveform, that means that if somebody’s coming into the office, and in a meeting room, or somebody happens to be working from home, they both have a more inclusive way of working together, they both have a voice, and they can communicate effectively as well, too. So all of our productivity suites are in that type of framework. How can we help the end user productivity, so they can contribute to the company’s goal?
Q – So now talking about 2023 and onwards, what do you think the trend is going to be?
- I will say that you can see some very key trends. Yesterday, we announced the integration of chat GPT into Bing, you’re gonna see more AI integrated, not just from the perspective of what we’re hearing in the news right now. But even simple things. Like I have a conversation with you, I happen to be in a coffee shop, doing it in a way that you don’t hear the background noise, that’s AI technology at work. And that requires software and hardware to work in a harmonious way, in a seamless way. So you’re gonna see more integration of AI across the industry to create wonderful user experiences, not just for buzzwords, but user experiences. So I see more of that happening. And that will mean that the market will respond and invest more in these areas and then create opportunities for everyone.
Q- What are the plans for your partners?
- So, partners are critical. We’re a partner-led organization and they’re the ones who are working with our customers, to bring technology to them, to make sure they’re doing it in a way that is safe. The aim was to optimize it so that it can roll up technology in a way that is done in an effectively secure way and allows productivity to stay high. And when we work with our partners, we listen to them because they’re, they’re getting the heartbeat of our customers. And they’re saying, hey, our customers are looking for these procurement vehicles. This way is to purchase I’m looking for this way to deliver technology. So we’re going to continue that as we move forward to work with our partners to make sure that we’re bringing the best experience to them and to our end customers.
Q- Any last few words you’d like to add?
- Yeah, look, I think we’re living in an exciting time right now for the technology to not be a distracting factor not to get in the way, but to enable the way. So I would stay tuned here in terms of what we can do. I believe Microsoft is leading in this space, and they do it because we work backwards from our customers. And we work with our partners to make sure we have a great experience.
Thank you, Zubin and it was nice speaking with you.
This was an audio conversation at the event.
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