Ford Upgrades to Windows 7

Windows 7 is an important milestone for the evolution of the popular operating system designed by Microsoft and the Redmond-based software manufacturer tries its best to promote it. The last attempt to do so is an agreement with several companies from various sectors of the industry that agreed to upgrade their computers to Windows 7.

Ford is one of these companies, according to a report by Bloomberg, so the US-based carmaker will soon install Windows 7 on all its computers. Other well-known names include Continental Airlines Inc., Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. and Intel Corp.

The involved companies are still working on a number of solutions needed to promote Windows 7 but more information is yet to be disclosed at this point.

However, Microsoft expects the upgrade to the latest contraption of Windows to take several years as other companies, under the pressure of the economic slowdown, are avoiding spending money on software application and prefer to remain to their current operating systems.

“We’re going to have to compete for a share of that IT budget,” Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was quoted as saying.

Microsoft is still trying to promote Windows 7 before the official launch, as the company expects the operating system to sell better compared to its predecessor, Windows Vista. According to a study conducted by Goldman Sachs Group Inc., 24 percent of companies are going to upgrade their computers to Windows 7 in the first 12 to 18 months. For the sake of comparison, Windows Vista was installed on only 10 percent of workstations in the same time frame.