Microsoft announced today that it will no longer making major announcements or keynote speeches at CES, one of the world’s largest consumer electronics shows, held every January in Las Vegas.
This means that next months keynote from Microsoft, who have made some massive keynotes over the 10 years, will be its last. The reason given behind the decision is that the timing of the event no longer fits with their product cycles.
The announcement was made in a blog post by Microsoft Vice President Frank Shaw, he said that the company will still attend in small capacity, but it will no longer be there taking to the stage to deliver keynote speeches.
He said: “We have decided that this coming January will be our last keynote presentation and booth at CES.”
“We’ll continue to participate in CES as a great place to connect with partners and customers across the PC, phone and entertainment industries, but we won’t have a keynote or booth after this year because our product news milestones generally don’t align with the show’s January timing.”
Some of you may remember that the very first Xbox was first unveiled at CES by Bill Gates, but over the years they tended to leave their major announcements like Kinect until E3, which is held every year in May.
Microsoft currently hosts a number of conferences such as MIX and Build, where it has recently announced Windows 8, Windows Phone and Microsoft Kinect developments.
Now our attention switches to January. Will they look to go out with a bang? Well, there have been rumours of a new Xbox, but the current thinking from Engadget is that they will recap it developments over the past year and there will not be any major hardware unveil.
The news is obviously a bad blow for CES, Microsoft has traditionally kicked-off the event with its keynote and major announcements – whatever happens to CES – Ballmer and Gates will be sourly missed.
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