(Bloomberg) — Microsoft Corp. — working to overhaul its operating system software in a world dominated by mobile computing — said it plans to release the new Windows 10 in 190 countries in the Northern Hemisphere’s summer.
The software would be released in 111 languages, the company said today in a statement that coincided with its Windows Hardware Engineering Community conference in Shenzhen, China. The software will feature a number of Windows 10 customizations for the China market, such as its Cortana personal assistant in Mandarin.
The company, which first showed off Windows 10 in September and gave a fuller preview in January, had said the new software would go on sale sometime this year. Windows 10 features a new Web browser that will replace Internet Explorer for most consumers. Personal-computer shipments will decline 4.9 percent this year, IDC said last week, more than the researcher had previously projected. Top chipmaker Intel Corp. last week cut its forecast for first-quarter sales, citing weak corporate demand.
In January, Microsoft also announced a version of the software called Windows Holographic, and a headset with glasses called the HoloLens that will let users see holograms while tracking a user’s voice, motion and surroundings. The glasses will be available in the same time frame as Windows 10, the company said at the time.
Microsoft also attempted a radical overhaul of Windows with the previous version, Windows 8. The Redmond, Washington-based company wound up with unhappy corporate customers, who found the program’s new design difficult to use. With Windows 10, Microsoft is trying to merge design elements from Windows 7 with some of version 8’s changes, and is once again trying to appeal to tablet and mobile-phone customers, an area where Windows has won minimal market share.
