Microsoft has been hired by India’s body for education development as its largest cloud customer to date, as part of efforts to modernise the country’s schools and reduce IT costs.
Microsoft’s Live@edu service will be rolled out to more than 10,000 technical colleges and institutes throughout India. It will be available to more than 7 million students, and half a million faculty members.
This is huge. Seven Million students and half a million Faculty members and all this under the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), a body which is responsible for accreditation of all the colleges in India, colleges which are swelling and bursting at the seams with thousands of new students and courses getting added every year. Microsoft wins this against stiff competition from IBM and Google.