Business Daily 제공: Microsoft at 50, 2025년 4월 4일
https://podcasts.apple.com/kr/podcast/business-daily/id261786876?i=1000702055149


Welcome to Business Daily on the BBC World Service. I'm the BBC's technology editor, Zoe Kleinman, and today we're in Seattle, in the United States, to take you behind the scenes at Microsoft.

BBC 월드 서비스의 Business Daily에 오신 것을 환영합니다. 저는 BBC의 기술 에디터 조이 클라인먼(Zoe Kleinman)입니다. 오늘은 미국 시애틀에 위치한 마이크로소프트 본사로 여러분을 안내해 그 이면을 들여다보려 합니다.


It's not a place for the faint of heart. That's one of the things that I learned right away.
As the tech giant marks 50 years since its founding, we look at how it became one of the world's biggest companies.

이곳은 심약한 사람들을 위한 곳은 아닙니다 (not a place for the faint of heart). 제가 가장 먼저 깨달은 사실 중 하나였죠. 이 기술 대기업은 설립 50주년을 맞이했습니다. 우리는 이 회사가 어떻게 세계 최대 기업 중 하나가 되었는지 살펴봅니다.


What got us here is not to be obsessed about longevity, but to be more obsessed about relevance.
And ask what the firm's focus on AI means for its future.

우리를 이 자리에 오게 한 것은 장수(longevity)에 집착하지 않고 (not to be obsessed about) 관련성 (relevance)에 더욱 집착한 (obsessed) 덕분입니다. 또한 이 회사가 인공지능(AI)에 집중하고 있는 것이 미래에 어떤 의미를 갖는지도 알아봅니다.


This is something that historically, highly manual, very boring, not exciting part of the job, but the agent's able to go do that for me automatically.
That's all coming up on today's programme.
Welcome to Building 87. This is a group of a bunch of different labs all focused on hardware.
We're on a tour of one of the most important tech headquarters in the world.
The building was built to support Surface, Xbox and Quantum but it's primarily Surface.

이건 예전에는 매우 수작업적이고 지루하고 전혀 흥미롭지 않은 일이었는데, 이제는 에이전트가 자동으로 해주죠.
이 모든 것이 오늘 방송에서 다뤄질 예정입니다.
Building 87에 오신 것을 환영합니다. 이곳은 다양한 실험실들이 모여 있으며, 모두 하드웨어에 초점을 맞추고 있습니다.
우리는 세계에서 가장 중요한 기술 본부 중 하나를 둘러보는 중입니다.
이 건물은 서피스(Surface), 엑스박스(Xbox), 양자 컴퓨팅(Quantum)을 지원하기 위해 지어졌지만 주로 서피스를 중심으로 운영되고 있습니다.


We're here because 50 years ago, in a now legendary startup story, two school friends dropped out of university and founded a company.
It's only because we'd read about the computer properly, were we able to take the program and have it run. And so Paul was very excited and called me up when that worked. And that's really when I dropped out of school and started Microsoft.

우리가 이곳에 있는 이유는 50년 전, 이제는 전설이 된 창업 스토리에서 두 명의 학교 친구가 대학을 중퇴하고 회사를 창업했기 때문입니다.
“우리는 컴퓨터에 대해 제대로 읽었기 때문에, 프로그램을 실행할 수 있었어요. 그래서 폴이 매우 흥분해서 저에게 전화했죠. 그게 바로 제가 학교를 중퇴하고 마이크로소프트를 시작하게 된 계기예요.”


That, of course, is Bill Gates talking about his friend and co-founder Paul Allen. Now as part of a series of events to mark this milestone anniversary, Microsoft has invited us as part of a small group of journalists to a series of events at its head office in Seattle, including a Q&A with its chief executive Satya Nadella.
What got us here is not to be obsessed about longevity, but to be more obsessed about relevance.

이 목소리는 마이크로소프트 공동 창업자인 빌 게이츠(Bill Gates)의 이야기입니다. 그의 친구이자 공동 창업자인 폴 앨런(Paul Allen)과 함께 한 이야기죠. 50주년을 기념하는 일련의 행사 중 하나로, 마이크로소프트는 우리를 포함한 소수의 기자단을 본사에 초청해 행사에 참여하게 했습니다. 그 중 하나는 CEO 사티아 나델라(Satya Nadella)와의 질의응답(Q&A) 세션이었죠.
“우리를 이 자리에 오게 한 것은 장수에 집착하지 않고, 관련성에 더 집중한 덕분입니다 (more obsessed about relevance).”


Size matters in Seattle. The journey to Microsoft's Redmond campus from the city centre takes you across the world's longest floating bridge. If you look closely, you can catch a glimpse of Bill Gates' enormous lakeside mansion, Xanadu 2.0.

시애틀에서는 규모가 중요합니다 (Size matters). 시내에서 마이크로소프트의 레드먼드(Redmond) 캠퍼스로 가려면 세계에서 가장 긴 부교(floating bridge)를 건너야 합니다. 자세히 보면, 빌 게이츠의 호숫가 대저택 ‘잔두 2.0(Xanadu 2.0)’을 살짝 볼 수 있습니다.


And when you arrive at Microsoft HQ, well, it's also huge. It's set in 520 acres of land. Around 50,000 people work here.
It's home to 130 buildings, five beehives, there is indeed Microsoft Honey and three tree houses. No surprise when you consider this company has a stock market valuation of $2.8 trillion.

마이크로소프트 본사에 도착하면 그 규모에 또 한 번 놀라게 됩니다. 총 520에이커의 부지 위에 있으며, 약 5만 명이 이곳에서 일합니다.
이곳에는 130개의 건물, 5개의 양봉장(beehives), 그리고 실제로 판매되는 ‘마이크로소프트 꿀(Microsoft Honey)’, 나무 위에 지어진 집 세 채가 있습니다.
이 회사의 주식 시장 평가액이 2.8조 달러라는 점을 생각하면 놀랍지도 않습니다.


There are many worlds within this tech town. They fight cyberattacks here, design silicon chips, create new Minecraft experiences, research quantum, build the AI tools of the future, and they keep everything. Patty Thibodeau is Microsoft's archivist.

이 기술 도시 안에는 많은 세계들이 존재합니다. 사이버 공격에 맞서 싸우고, 실리콘 칩을 설계하고, 마인크래프트의 새로운 경험을 만들고, 양자 컴퓨팅을 연구하며, 미래의 AI 도구들을 개발하고, 이 모든 것을 보존합니다.
패티 티보도(Patty Thibodeau)는 마이크로소프트의 기록보관 책임자(archivist)입니다.


We have a little bit of everything from our hardware, our software, and everything in between. Things related to gaming as well as the items that are made throughout the process of our development. So we have a wide array of content, whether it be physical items, video, photos, as well as the documentation that lead into all those.

Do you have less physical stuff now because so much more of our stuff is digitized?
You would think. The thing is, a lot of what we're creating is still physical. We are still creating hardware and things like that.
So we are slowly creating more prototypes. It's not just like, this is step one and we have one prototype. It'll be stage one with 50 different prototypes.So we are still collecting a lot of physical content.

“우리는 하드웨어, 소프트웨어, 그 외의 모든 것을 조금씩 가지고 있어요. 게임 관련 자료나 개발 과정에서 만들어진 물품도 있습니다. 실제 물건, 영상, 사진, 문서 등 다양한 콘텐츠(wide array of content)를 수집하고 있습니다.”
“지금은 대부분이 디지털화되었기 때문에 실물 수집이 줄었나요?”
“그럴 것 같지만, 여전히 실물 자료를 많이 만들어내고 있어요. 우리는 여전히 하드웨어를 만들고 있으니까요.
단지 ‘1단계 프로토타입 하나’만 있는 게 아니라, 1단계에만 50개가 넘는 다양한 프로토타입이 있어요. 그래서 여전히 실물 콘텐츠를 많이 수집하고 있습니다.”


Is there a particular decade that was the most prolific, that you've got the most stuff from?
Probably the 90s. I mean, that was, you know, Windows 98, Windows 95. A lot of our big innovations happened around that period.
Not that we aren't innovating now, but things like Copilot, things like that, are still so new that we don't really have collections for those yet because we're trying to figure out how are we collecting on those new products. So given that there's been a good amount of time from the 90s, we are still collecting quite a bit from those areas.

“가장 많은 자료가 모여 있는 시기는 언제인가요?”
“아마 90년대일 거예요. 윈도우 95, 98 등 큰 혁신들이 있던 시기죠. 지금도 AI 코파일럿(Copilot) 같은 혁신들이 있지만, 아직은 너무 새로워서 어떤 방식으로 수집할지 고민 중이에요.”


And how are you preserving it all?
We have our temperature-controlled vaults. So we have a vault that we keep at 55 degrees, 45 percent relative humidity year round. So anything that we can do to just expand the life of these products just a little bit longer so we can use them for reuse and learning.

“그 많은 자료들을 어떻게 보관하나요?”
“온도와 습도를 일정하게 유지하는 금고에 보관해요. 연중 내내 섭씨 약 13도, 습도 45% 정도로 유지하죠. 이런 방식으로 조금이라도 더 오래 보존해, 재사용하고 배울 수 있도록 하고 있어요.”


And you've got clothes here, haven't you? You've got costumes, you've got motorbikes, you've got, it's not just operating system manuals.
Yes. Now we have a lot of various items that we have collected throughout the history of Microsoft that go beyond just our hardware, our software, because we want to be able to tell the story of Microsoft and not just our product, but our people.

“옷이나 의상, 오토바이 같은 것도 있다고 들었는데요?”
“네. 하드웨어, 소프트웨어를 넘어 마이크로소프트의 역사를 보여줄 수 있는 다양한 아이템들을 보관 중이에요. 제품뿐만 아니라 사람들의 이야기도 전하고 싶으니까요.”


One of those people right at the top is Brad Smith. He's one of the company's longest serving executives, having joined in 1993 as part of its legal team. Now he's Microsoft's president and vice chair.

마이크로소프트 최고 법률 책임자 출신이자 현재는 사장(President) 겸 부회장(Vice Chair)인 브래드 스미스(Brad Smith)도 그 ‘사람’ 중 하나입니다.
그는 1993년에 입사해 현재까지 재직 중인 오랜 임원 중 한 명입니다.


To me, what's most exciting is that Microsoft has stayed relevant by constantly focusing on how to make computing what I would say more accessible to people and genuinely beneficial to people from individuals to say, small businesses to governments. Fifty years ago, basically, you could not fit a computer into even a large flat in London. They were so large, but Microsoft helped make computers not only smaller, but cheaper, more powerful, more beneficial.
We're doing it today with AI. It's really a story of constant reinvention.

“마이크로소프트가 지속적으로 관련성을 유지해 온 비결은 (stayed relevant) 컴퓨팅을 보다 접근 가능하게(accessible) 만들고, 개인에서부터 중소기업, 정부에 이르기까지 실질적인 혜택을 주기 위한 노력(genuinely beneficial)을 계속해 왔기 때문이라고 생각합니다. 50년 전에는 런던의 아파트 하나에도 컴퓨터가 들어가지 못할 정도로 거대했어요. 하지만 마이크로소프트는 그것을 작고, 저렴하고, 강력하고, 유용하게 만든 거죠. 지금은 AI를 통해 같은 일을 하고 있습니다. 이것은 끊임없는 혁신의 이야기(story of constant reinvention)입니다.”


You have to keep on top of that really quite fast moving wave, don't you?
It's been fascinating for me as somebody who's been here more than 31 years. You could look at Microsoft and say, wow, you've been such a successful company. Every year, it feels like we're behind because the frontier keeps moving.
But it's not a place for the faint of heart. That's one of the things that I learned right away when I arrived in 1993 having joined from having spent four years working in London.

그 빠르게 움직이는 흐름을 계속 따라잡아야 하잖아요? (keep on top of that really quite fast moving wave)”
저처럼 31년 넘게 이곳에 있는 사람에게는 정말 흥미로운 경험이었어요(fascinating).
마이크로소프트를 보면 누구나 ‘와, 정말 성공한 회사(successful company)구나’라고 생각할 수 있겠죠.
하지만 매년 우리는 마치 뒤처지고 있는 것 같은 기분이 들어요. 왜냐하면 최전선(frontier)이 계속 앞으로 나아가기 때문이에요(keeps moving).
하지만 이곳은 겁이 많은 사람(faint of heart)이 있을 곳이 아니에요.
1993년에 이곳에 도착했을 때, 저는 그걸 바로 깨달았어요. 그전에는 런던에서 4년간 일하다가 이곳에 합류하게 됐거든요(having joined from having spent four years working in London).



What do you mean by that?
Well, it requires a certain intensity. It requires a certain ambition. I think it requires a certain humility.
That's what I've always tried to encourage our employees to think about. You can't slow down. If you slow down in this industry, you are left behind.


Now, with the AI revolution that we're living through, the pace is faster than ever, isn't it? Is that the direction of the next 50 years?
I do believe the time from now to the middle of the 21st century will fundamentally be defined by artificial intelligence as quite possibly the single most technology development. It will change the way we work, the way we interact. It will change, say, the National Health Service, how citizens interact with their health provider.
And it will be constantly reshaping our industry. It will be reshaping economies.

물론입니다! 요청하신 형식대로 중급 이상의 단어와 숙어는 굵게, 괄호 안에 영어 원문을 함께 표기해 아래와 같이 번역했습니다:

이제 우리가 겪고 있는 AI 혁명(AI revolution) 속에서는, 속도가 그 어느 때보다 더 빠르잖아요?
그게 앞으로 50년의 **방향(direction)**이 될까요?

저는 지금부터 21세기 중반까지의 시간이 **인공지능(artificial intelligence)**에 의해 근본적으로 정의될 것이라고 믿습니다(will fundamentally be defined by).
아마도 단일 기술 발전 중에서 가장 중요한 것이 될 수도 있죠 (single most technology development).
그것은 우리가 일하는 방식, 서로 **소통하는 방식(the way we interact)**을 바꿔놓을 거예요.
예를 들어, 국민보건서비스(National Health Service)나 시민들이 의료 서비스 제공자와 **소통하는 방식(how citizens interact with their health provider)**도 변화시킬 겁니다.
그리고 그것은 끊임없이 우리 산업을 재편하고(reshaping), 경제를 다시 구성하게 될 것입니다(will be reshaping economies).


And that is quite a scary thought for lots of people, isn't it? You know, we are talking about a dramatic change in not only how the world runs, but also what jobs we do.
I think change is always a little bit scary and hopefully a little bit or more than a little bit exciting. And believe me, there are days when, I think for all of us, we are like, can please, could the world just spin a little more slowly for a few days, we could catch a break. But I think there is a lot that we have done over the last few centuries in various parts of the world to figure out how to adapt to change.
We are going to have to take those lessons and apply it again.

그리고 그것은 많은 사람들에게 꽤 **무서운 생각(scary thought)**이죠, 그렇지 않나요?
우리가 지금 얘기하는 건 단지 세상이 돌아가는 방식뿐만 아니라,
우리가 어떤 일을 하느냐(what jobs we do)까지 **극적인 변화(dramatic change)**에 대한 것이니까요.

저는 **변화(change)**는 항상 약간은 무서울 수 있고,
희망적으로는(hopefully) 약간 아니면 그 이상으로 흥미로운(exiting) 것이기도 하다고 생각해요.

그리고 믿으세요, 우리 모두가 그런 생각을 할 때가 있잖아요.
“세상이 며칠만이라도 좀 천천히 돌아갔으면 좋겠어. 우리도 좀 숨 돌릴 틈이 필요하잖아.”
그렇지만 지난 몇 세기 동안, 세계 곳곳에서 우리는 변화에 어떻게 적응해야 할지(figure out how to adapt to change) 많은 것들을 배워왔죠.
이제 우리는 그 교훈들을 다시 적용해야 할(apply it again) 시점이에요.


Is there anything that you think AI either can or should not do?
Well, to me, the most important principle is that AI needs to be a tool to help humans. And we should make sure that humans not only remain in the loop, but remain the decision makers for the things that are truly consequential in people's lives. That is true in a great many areas of life.
We want the fundamental decisions made by the governments that lead us to be made by the people we elect, not computers that they may turn to for some information and analysis. So, I just think that it almost starts with a fundamental philosophy. AI needs to serve humanity.
And if we build and deploy this technology with that philosophy and that principle in mind, I at least will be more optimistic about the future of humanity.

AI가 할 수 없거나 하면 안 된다고 생각하는 것이 있나요?

글쎄요, 제게 가장 중요한 **원칙(principle)**은 AI는 인간을 돕기 위한 **도구(tool)**가 되어야 한다는 점입니다.
그리고 우리는 인간이 단지 **과정에 포함되는 것(remain in the loop)**을 넘어서,
**사람들의 삶에 진정으로 중대한 일들(things that are truly consequential in people’s lives)**에 대해
**의사 결정을 내리는 사람(remain the decision makers)**으로 남아야 한다는 것을 반드시 확실히 해야 합니다.

그건 삶의 아주 많은 영역에서 해당되는 이야기예요.
우리를 이끄는 정부들이 내리는 **기본적인 결정들(fundamental decisions)**은
정보나 분석을 위해 컴퓨터에 의존하더라도,
**우리가 선출한 사람들(the people we elect)**에 의해 이루어져야 합니다.

그래서 제 생각에는 이 모든 것은 **근본적인 철학(fundamental philosophy)**에서 출발한다고 봅니다.
AI는 인류에 봉사해야(serve humanity) 합니다.

그리고 우리가 그런 철학과 원칙을 염두에 두고 이 기술을 개발하고 배포한다면(build and deploy this technology),
적어도 저는 인류의 미래에 대해 더 **낙관적(optimistic)**으로 생각할 수 있을 겁니다.


There are two costs to AI which are very high at the moment. One is compute and the other is the environmental cost. Can we as a planet afford it?
I do believe we can afford it and I believe we should afford it in large part because of the benefits it will bring. It means having more sources of carbon-free energy, whether it's wind or solar or hydro or nuclear. It means having greener concrete, greener steel, greener chips, meaning chips that are produced in plants that run on greener energy themselves.

AI에는 현재로서 두 가지 매우 큰 **비용(costs)**이 있습니다.
하나는 **연산 자원(compute)**이고, 다른 하나는 **환경적 비용(environmental cost)**입니다.
지구 전체로 봤을 때, 우리가 그걸 감당할 수 있을까요?(Can we as a planet afford it?)

저는 우리가 감당할 수 있다고 믿습니다.
그리고 우리가 그 비용을 감당해야 한다고 생각합니다(we should afford it) —
그 이유는 이 기술이 가져올 **혜택들(benefits)**이 크기 때문입니다.

이것은 더 많은 **탄소 없는 에너지원(carbon-free energy sources)**을 확보한다는 걸 의미하죠.
예를 들면 풍력(wind), 태양광(solar), 수력(hydro), 원자력(nuclear) 등이 될 수 있습니다.

또한 이것은 더 친환경적인 콘크리트(greener concrete),
더 친환경적인 철강(greener steel),
그리고 **더 친환경적인 칩(greener chips)**을 의미합니다.
여기서 ‘친환경적인 칩’이란,
**친환경 에너지(greener energy)**로 작동하는 공장에서 생산되는(produced in plants) 칩을 말하는 거예요.



I remain optimistic that we are going to achieve our goals.
This is Business Daily on the BBC World Service. I'm Zoe Kleinman and today we're looking at Microsoft's 50-year journey and asking where the company goes next. Of course, over that half century, the company has come in for a lot of criticism.
There have been accusations of monopolistic business practices and countless lawsuits, including from the US government.
Famously, about halfway through the 50 years, back in 1998, it was sued because of its monopoly place in tech. It literally put Netscape, a very famous Silicon Valley company, out of business because of the browser wars that were famous. This is a company that used its size and market capitalization, its stock value, to dominate industries.

저는 우리가 목표를 달성할 것이라고 여전히 낙관하고 있습니다(I remain optimistic that we are going to achieve our goals).

여러분은 지금 BBC 월드 서비스의 **비즈니스 데일리(Business Daily)**를 듣고 계십니다.
저는 **조이 클라인먼(Zoe Kleinman)**입니다.
오늘은 마이크로소프트의 50년 여정을 살펴보고,
이 회사가 앞으로 어디로 향할지를 질문하고 있습니다.

물론 지난 반세기 동안, 이 회사는 많은 **비판(criticism)**을 받아왔죠.

**독점적 사업 관행(monopolistic business practices)**에 대한 **비난(accusations)**과
미국 정부를 포함한 수많은 **소송(lawsuits)**이 있었고요.

특히 50년의 중간쯤인 1998년,
마이크로소프트는 기술 분야에서의 **독점적 지위(monopoly place in tech)**로 인해 소송을 당했습니다(was sued).
당시 그 유명한 실리콘밸리 기업 **넷스케이프(Netscape)**를 사실상 무너뜨렸죠(put … out of business) — 그 유명한 브라우저 전쟁(browser wars) 때문이었습니다.
이 회사는 자신의 규모와 시가총액(its size and market capitalization),
즉 **주식 가치(stock value)**를 이용해
산업을 지배해 왔습니다(dominated industries).


Scott Budman is a technology reporter for NBC, based in Silicon Valley.
The legacy of a gigantic company that by sheer size and wealth can buy out its competitors and just own a marketplace is intimidating to a lot of people even today. There are plenty of young people who think, I have a good idea. I have a way to do something better.
Let's start a company. But they're so worried that Microsoft is going to get into that game that they may be moved somewhere else and do something safer. And the world misses a good idea because of that fear.
But Microsoft itself has had a couple of big misses, most famously the phone.
Yes, Microsoft has struggled when it comes to certain consumer products, which is interesting because it does consumer software as well as business software well. It does video games, perhaps the ultimate consumer product if you're a young person. It does that very well, but it has struck out on a couple of big things.

**스콧 버드맨(Scott Budman)**은 실리콘밸리에 본사를 둔 NBC의 **기술 전문 기자(technology reporter)**입니다.

**엄청난 규모와 자산(sheer size and wealth)**을 가진 거대 기업이
**경쟁자를 인수(buy out its competitors)**하고 시장을 **장악하는 것(just own a marketplace)**은
오늘날에도 여전히 많은 사람들에게 위협적입니다(intimidating).

많은 젊은이들이 이렇게 생각합니다.
“나는 좋은 아이디어가 있어(I have a good idea). 뭔가 더 나은 방법이 있어(I have a way to do something better).”
그래서 회사를 시작해보려 하지만,
마이크로소프트가 그 시장에 뛰어들까 봐 너무 걱정이 되는 거죠(so worried that Microsoft is going to get into that game).
그래서 결국 더 안전한 분야로 옮겨가게 되고,
그 결과 세상은 좋은 아이디어를 놓치게 됩니다(the world misses a good idea) —
그 두려움(fear) 때문에 말이죠.

하지만 정작 마이크로소프트도 **몇 가지 큰 실패(big misses)**를 경험했습니다.
가장 유명한 건 **휴대폰 사업(the phone)**이죠.

맞습니다, 마이크로소프트는 어떤 **소비자용 제품들(consumer products)**에 있어
고전을 면치 못했습니다(has struggled).
흥미로운 점은, 이 회사는 소비자용 소프트웨어와 기업용 소프트웨어 둘 다 잘 만들어낸다는 점입니다.
또한 비디오 게임(video games)—아마도 젊은 세대에게는 **최고의 소비재(ultimate consumer product)**라고 할 수 있는 분야—도
아주 잘 해내고 있습니다(does that very well).

하지만 몇 가지 중요한 분야에서 참패를 겪었습니다(has struck out on a couple of big things).



You're right. Phones Microsoft never got around to. It bought entire phone companies.
I mean, it bought Nokia's handset company. Nokia, a very successful phone maker. It still couldn't make that work.
It also famously bombed with the Zune, which was the idea that Microsoft would make our own iPod and nobody bought it. It obviously didn't turn out to be a success. And everywhere you look, you now see either iPods or now iPhones.
But the music player became a huge thing, and Microsoft just could not successfully get in there.

맞아요.
마이크로소프트는 결국 휴대폰 사업에서는 손을 제대로 못 댔습니다(Phones Microsoft never got around to).
**휴대폰 회사를 통째로 인수(bought entire phone companies)**하기도 했죠.

그러니까, 노키아의 휴대폰 사업부를 인수했어요(It bought Nokia’s handset company).
노키아는 한때 정말 **성공적인 휴대폰 제조업체(a very successful phone maker)**였잖아요.
그런데도 마이크로소프트는 그걸 제대로 활용하지 못했죠(It still couldn’t make that work).

또 하나의 대표적인 실패는 ‘준(Zune)’이었습니다(famously bombed with the Zune).
그건 마이크로소프트가 **우리만의 아이팟을 만들어보자(make our own iPod)**는 아이디어였는데,
아무도 사지 않았습니다(nobody bought it).
결국 성공하지 못했죠(It obviously didn’t turn out to be a success).

지금 어디를 봐도, 그 자리는 결국 아이팟이나 아이폰이 차지했습니다(everywhere you look, you now see either iPods or now iPhones).
그런데 음악 플레이어 시장이 그렇게까지 커졌음에도 불구하고(became a huge thing),
마이크로소프트는 거기에 성공적으로 진입하지 못했던 겁니다(could not successfully get in there).


What's the view of people in the US of Microsoft? Is it a national treasure or is it something that they don't quite trust?

That's a great question. I think overall, it's something they don't quite trust. It is the behemoth of behemoths, right?
It's Microsoft. It's something that's been in most of our lives or our entire lives. Here in Silicon Valley, where I sit, it was known as the Evil Empire.
It was actually called that. Why? Well, because it was so big and it was somewhere else.
It was way up in Seattle, which, by the way, is not that far from Silicon Valley. It's a quick flight. Microsoft has since put a big beachhead down here in Silicon Valley.

It's part of our ecosystem. I think because it's been part of our lives for so long and so big, it's always been seen as this huge company. But if you break it down, some of the products, whether the software, ChatGPT from OpenAI, Minecraft, which even my daughters play, people really like the individual products without even knowing that they're connected to Microsoft.
What do you think the next 50 years holds for Microsoft?
I think, and it's almost amazing, I think maybe 20 years ago we wouldn't have been talking about the next 50 years. We would have thought this company is just going to run aground at some point, whether for legal issues or just because it doesn't move quickly enough to keep up with the times. But now that it's doing that, the next 50 years actually look like whatever the next 50 years in tech look like.

And so to the future. The company is going all in on artificial intelligence. It's pumped billions into various projects, including its commercial partnership with CHAT GP Teamaker's Open AI.
So what's the next big step? Corporate Vice President for Business and Industry co-pilot Charles LaManna is convinced it's something called agentic AI.
An agent works on its own. It can go and complete things completely in the background, run for hours or days even. We see the way we're going to interact with them will even feel different.
You'll send them an email and you'll get an email back the next day or you'll add them to a meeting and they'll wait there and only when they feel like it's the right time interject with a suggestion or a recommendation or they'll listen to changes in a database or an application. So lots of different ways of interacting with the agents that aren't just chat.

Charles is showing me an example of one of its AI agents. This one is used by the consulting firm McKinsey. The idea is to increase productivity.
You can see here's an example from a client asking to go do a project for Horizon Tech Solutions and they describe some of the requirements in email. And the way McKinsey used to do this is they have a team of scheduling individuals who get these emails and they spend about 20 days on average to get the right team assembled in the right location with the right expertise. What they're able to do is to create an agent which would listen to these emails.
And what their scheduling desk is then able to do is they go to copilot and the idea is inside of copilot I have all these agents on the right hand side and I'll ask it to evaluate a request. So this is basically it's telling it go to the email, look at the pending requests and tell me what your recommendation is. It will give a recommendation, here's what they're asking for, here's the timeline and budget they have and here's even some teams that I'd recommend to go schedule.
This is something that historically highly manual, very boring, not exciting part of the job but the agent is able to go do that for me automatically and they're making the job more efficient for that scheduling desk.
It's very specific isn't it?

Yes.
You have to be very clear in your instructions.
The way I say is if you hired someone to your team and want to document how they should behave, you kind of need that same level of specificity. And then one thing which makes agents really different from chatbots is they can actually do things, they can take action, drive changes, update a system or send emails or make scheduling requests.
Are they expensive?
I'd say it's all relative. They're more expensive than like a classic web application or website but a lot cheaper than having to go find an expert or in most cases it's just completely unserved need. They're not perfect.
Neither are people. So you want to make sure you have the right systems and protections and guardrails so if they're 95% accurate, that's enough to get the job done 100% of the time. And you can do that.

And in the case of McKinsey, that's why they still have this step over here where the person is reviewing the suggestion before the agent proceeds. So kind of the idea of people and agents working together.
After four days of wandering around its huge Seattle campus, it's clear Microsoft isn't planning on going anywhere. Throughout competing, buying up or sometimes crushing its rivals, it's managed to stay among the top players in the tech world. Right now it's throwing everything behind AI.
But whatever the next big advances over the next 50 years, Microsoft wants to be there, right at the centre of innovation. Thanks for listening to this edition of Business Daily. Today's episode was produced by Imran Rahman-Jones, Georgina Hayes and Rumella Dasgupta and presented by me, Zoe Kleinman.