Julie Bort, for Business Insider, reports on Satya Nadella’s demo, where he used an iPhone. Three quick things:
1. A CEO doing a product demo. We need more of that.
2. A CEO using a competitor’s product. (Admittedly, he doesn’t own that iPhone.) In my experience, the more secure a CEO felt about his/her ideas and market reality, the more comfortable they felt mentioning or using a competitor’s product.
3. Microsoft apps for iOS. Pretty amazing how many productivity apps they’ve done, and many are well received. I know it’s not a new story, but it’s still cool. Take a look at the screenshot from Nadella’s phone to see the extent. Julie Bort offers a nice summary of each.
So, again: here we had a CEO using a competitor’s product and developing for it. Did the world come to an end? Did this, in itself, cause that CEO’s company any issues? No; quite the opposite. Refreshing to see Nadella’s attitude. More broadly, note that the Mac Office team in Redmond have essentially been loyal Apple supporters (in deeds) for years. All good stuff.
