The lessons from Microsoft’s startling comeback

“It is kinda like the Nineties are back,“ crowed Satya Nadella, the boss of Microsoft, at a product launch in New York on September 21st. He was referring to the glory days of the software giant, when its Windows operating system was ubiquitous, profits were soaring and revenues routinely grew by more than 30% a year. For a while Microsoft became the most valuable company in the world. But success bred complacency. By the early 2010s sales growth had slowed and profit margins had shrunk.