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Diane Greene

10/26/13

@ Y Combinator

To launch our product, we positioned it as a Linux tool, allowing users to run Microsoft Office applications in a Linux environment without needing multiple computers or dual booting.

Video

Diane Greene at Startup School 2013

@ Y Combinator

Diane Greene at Startup School 2013

10/26/13

Related Takeaways

Diane Greene

10/26/13

@ Y Combinator

We aimed to create a desktop product that would allow users to run Windows on Linux and vice versa, without requiring any changes from operating system or chipset vendors.

Diane Greene

08/05/17

@ Y Combinator

In the late 90s, during the dot-com era, we faced skepticism about our software that allowed users to run multiple operating systems on one machine.

Steve Ballmer

06/02/25

@ Acquired

At the time of my 'developers' speech, we were facing competition from Linux and needed to reinforce our platform with third-party support.

Bill Gates

02/21/25

@ Stripe

The slogan of Microsoft was 'a computer on every desk and in every home running Microsoft software', reflecting our vision for personal computing.

Varun Mohan

04/20/25

@ Lenny's Podcast

We provided our product entirely for free across all IDEs, which allowed us to optimize workloads significantly and attract a large user base.

Y Combinator Cast

07/30/18

@ Y Combinator

We're building the operating system for scientific labs, providing free software to improve productivity and making money through lab supplies.

Harvard Innovation Labs Cast

02/02/14

@ Harvard Innovation Labs

Google's strategy involved simplifying the user experience of Google Docs to attract users away from Microsoft Office, which was seen as overly complicated.

Brian Halligan

05/08/19

@ Y Combinator

Our initial idea was to create a suite of applications for law firms, but we pivoted to a marketing application for all businesses.

Harvard Innovation Labs Cast

02/02/14

@ Harvard Innovation Labs

Jim Whitehurst recognized that the true value of Linux was not just being another operating system, but ensuring it was certified and supported across various platforms for widespread use.