KT EXCLUSIVE: A Window to the world of Microsoft's Satya Nadella

Abu Dhabi - Microsoft CEO sits down with Khaleej Times to talk about the company's efforts in driving digital transformation

It was a busy day for him; as he had been in and out of meetings with customers, and some more to follow.

Yet, for Satya Nadella, the steadfast spirit he evokes in his own daily grind is a mix of ingredients that result in an ideal recipe for leading one of the world's most influential and recognised firms: quick-thinking, engaging, ready for anything, sensible.

And this is spilling over to the endless parade of companies and people relying on its innovations for progress.

"To me, one of the most important things that defines leadership is the real impact companies are having in or with the customers and partners," he says.

Nadella, the chief executive officer of Microsoft, was speaking to Khaleej Times in an exclusive interview at the tech giant's Abu Dhabi offices.

The CEO post at Microsoft has a storied past, from its legendary founder Bill Gates to the ever-energetic Steve Ballmer and now, Nadella. The man tasked to lead the company into the future began captaining the ship on February 2014 amidst an ocean of new technologies set to reshape the world has been a catalyst of change, who has a refreshing take on everything.

Digital transformation, a combination of technologies affecting change in all aspects of humans and society, has been a staple for Microsoft throughout its existence - it marked its 43rd year on April 4 - even though the term has gone mainstream in the not-so-distant past. From the first software it developed in 1973 - the Altair BASIC - to its present cutting-edge technologies, the commitment has been there to transform lives.

The present sees an influx of game-changing technologies, such as artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things. With the building blocks of these innovations coming together more and more, are there certain principles to follow?

"Great question," Nadella starts off, flashing his signature smile as he would the entire time - and he gives an example of what the UAE has done in this regard.

"The fact that the UAE has appointed an AI minister shows that you already are taking the steps to think through what it means to have new technologies, not only contribute to progress but also to think about what policies can be used to guard against any unintended consequence," he elaborates.

Topmost priority
The CEO, who hails from the Indian city of Hyderabad, explains that the UAE is taking the right steps by actually acknowledging the importance of some foundation technologies and getting ahead of it.

"For example," he continues, "one of the challenges of AI is that your attention can be hacked, so the point is how you use technology so that the attention - especially of young children - is not being hacked because being put to use on the things that matter the most to them in their development."

"That's a set of policies, a set of practices that can be put in place."

Nadella points out that Microsoft's topmost priority is bringing forth intelligent cloud and intelligent edge to the market. It may sound too geeky and technical, but actually, it's just a matter of equipping the right tools.

"Whether it's a smart factory, smart city or a smart hospital, you need both the cloud and the edge to have the computational resource, then the AI capabilities on top of these computational resource," he says.

Hence, "you can create the next generation of experiences and next generation of applications that are going to make these people, place and things smart."

"Transforming business applications. is now possible for the smallest of businesses to start automating, whether it's their customer relations, services, marketing, operations and completely bending the costs," he says. "We're very excited about that."

Regional power
Microsoft has been in the Middle East for over 25 years now. Nadella calls the region "one of its most important in the world", and it doesn't just show - it can be felt.

Or, to put it another way, being in the Middle East in itself is "living our mission" - and he backs it up with some powerful, encouraging words.

"That's why I come back to the region and it's fantastic to see the progress," he stresses.

"We have to be able to contribute to progress in the broader societies and economies everywhere," he says, adding that Microsoft is continuously looking for ways to bring more innovation into the mainstream, especially in the Middle East.

"There can't be more of an agenda," he adds, touting the more than 2,000 local  partners the company has in the region, who are taking these technologies and creating local solutions and local surplus," he stresses.

'Game-changer'
Going into specifics, Nadella specifically pointed out Microsoft's recent announcement that it will open two data centres in the UAE - one each in Abu Dhabi and Dubai - which will be the first ones in the Middle East and will be operational by 2019.

"That's a real game-changer," he says about the data centres.

This will enable Microsoft to deliver the intelligent, trusted cloud from its first UAE-based data centres, and empower organisations to recognise the unprecedented opportunity for digital transformation in the region.

Governments, large organisations and small and medium enterprises, as well as startups across all industries in the Gulf are making the most out of Microsoft's cloud solutions, engaging customers, empowering employees, optimising operations and transforming their products and services.

The Emirates Group, Emaar Properties, Etihad Airways, Majid Al Futtaim, Jumeirah Hotels and Resorts, Landmark Group, Daman Insurance, RAK Ceramics, Imdaad, Gulf Air, Ooredoo, Viva, Kuwait Finance House and Dubai World Trade Centre are among the numerous leading organisations that have chosen the trusted Microsoft Cloud as part of their digital transformation journey, empowering them to evolve their business end-to-end and achieve more.

Microsoft is making a capital investment to bring hyper-scaled cloud and AI technology with the aim of empowering local businesses.

"Small businesses here becoming more productive. Large businesses here becoming more competitive," he adds. "That's what's super-exciting to us." And it doesn't matter which industry you're in; it's a no-brainer that companies, especially those in the upper tier, need to leverage technology to get ahead.

The question now is, what can these firms do with new technologies like AI and IoT?

Earlier in the day, Nadella met with the UAE's Minister for Artificial Intelligence, Omar bin Sultan Al Olama, and had much to discuss. But there was a common denominator: building ways to put innovation to good use for continued progress.

"I've had a chance to meet [with the minister] and really work with him on building human capabilities," he says. "We also had a word about the 'One million Arab coders' projects - we have people locally capable of taking these technologies and deploying it in these industries."

Commitment
Earlier this month, Microsoft signed a memorandum of understanding with the Dubai Future Foundation to support the "One Million Arab Coders" initiative. The move aims at bridging the cloud skills gap amongst youth to build a future-ready workforce, and accelerate innovation, economic competitiveness, and smart initiatives in the country as well as the wider region.

He also met with a number of CEOs of various sectors in the UAE, hailing these firms as "world-class".

"Them having a vision in using AI and cloud technologies to automate and bring more insights and bringing next level of productivity and economic growth to the region," Nadella says.

"That," the CEO adds, "is what I think is going to be the most important here."

Which leads to the next step in the evolution of innovation: quantum computing, a technology capable of crunching numbers and data multiple times faster - stress on multiple there - which all the growing quantities of information in the world could use.

While still in its nascent stages, more attention is being given to quantum computing. And Nadella believes that there are increasing reasons to actually have one and put it to really good use.

"You're reaching the limits of even some of the foundational building blocks of computing," he says.

Whether it's climate change or a cure to cancer - unsolved problems, as he terms it - Nadella says that the way to solve this is to have more computing power.

"Microsoft is taking an approach of bringing new computer science. to build a quantum computer that you should think of it as the next generation, so we would see broader progress."

It's a challenging world, but Nadella and his entire organisation are up to it.
"It's all about empowering every person and organisation on the planet," he says. "It's about the core identity that gets really expressed with changing technology in a time when technology itself is having more and more impact in the world."

Fresh ideas, refreshing results. Just like his book is aptly entitled: Hit Refresh.
"A lot of technology will come and go but we want to continue creating technologies so that others can use that technology to create more technology that is going to be needed more going forward."

- alvin@khaleejtimes.com