Microsoft Confirms Enterprise Cloud Solutions Will Launch with Windows 8.1

People have been trying to guess for some time if all of Microsoft's lump offerings would be released at the same time as Windows 8.1. It was easy for Microsoft to promise the October 18^th, 2013 public release of Windows 8.1 since it had gone through many preview iterations and had finally been deemed RTM. But, the question still remained whether or not the other products could meet the Windows team's stringent milestone.

In an almost RTM-like fashion (without actually deeming it RTM), Microsoft has announced that Windows Server, System Center, Visual Studio, Windows Azure, Windows Intune, SQL Server, and Dynamics will all piggyback on the October 18^thWindows 8.1 product blast.

Microsoft made the announcement in a press release fashion and you can read the full post here:  Microsoft unleashes fall wave of enterprise cloud solutions

Satya Nadella, Executive Vice President, Cloud and Enterprise at Microsoft, also took a few minutes to type up his own thoughts on this monumental release. In The Enterprise Cloud takes center stage Satya talks about the successes of the enterprise business at Microsoft and says that enterprise IT represents 58% of total revenue for Microsoft. Of course there are thinly veiled marketing nuances in the post where it states that this area of Microsoft is called "enterprise cloud products and services" and he makes sure to highlight consumer services, then public cloud services, and then hybrid cloud services – in that order. The post was most likely vetted by Microsoft's marketing group, but it's still a good read.

Satya is rumored to still be in the running as a potential Steve Ballmer replacement as CEO. Personally, I believe he's the best fit, but my thoughts, of course, don't count.

What's more interesting than the release announcement, though, comes in the form of a concern. Many organizations running the Microsoft products being released en masse will not be able to update anytime soon. Microsoft's intent on tying the products and services so closely together that they all have to be released at once will cause problems for the majority of customers. Microsoft can't honestly expect IT Pros to keep up with the demand that the binge releases will cause. But, of course, that could be their intent. If companies would just move their apps and services to the Microsoft Cloud, the upgrade dilemma would go away. Microsoft would just update everything for them (in the Cloud) and the business consumers would always be running the most current revisions of software.

Your thoughts? Will you be able to keep up with recurring, massive product releases?