Microsoft offering millions to hire more foreign workers

Puget Sound Business Journal September 28, 2012, 6:53am PDT

Microsoft Corp. said it will offer millions of dollars so it can hire more foreign workers using H-1B temporary visas.

The Seattle Times reports Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) has thousands of high-tech job openings that it can't fill, and by expanding the H-1B program and by greatly increasing the fees charged for those visas, the country could use that money to train Americans to eventually fill those jobs.

Microsoft and GE Healthcare to Create New Joint Venture to Enable Better Population Health Management

Microsoft and GE Healthcare to Create New Joint Venture to Enable Better Population Health Management - The Official Microsoft Blog:

Jeffrey Meisner
7 Dec 2011 9:01 PM

I am pleased to share that Microsoft and GE Healthcare have just announced an exciting new initiative aimed at improving healthcare quality and the patient experience. The two companies are creating a joint venture that will combine Microsoft’s deep expertise in building platforms and ecosystems with GE Healthcare’s experience in clinical and administrative workflow solutions. The new venture, which is pending regulatory approval and has yet to be named, will develop and market an open, interoperable technology platform and next-generation clinical applications that will help enable better population health management. The new company will be headquartered near the Microsoft campus in Redmond, WA.

In addition to the new joint venture, GE Healthcare and Microsoft...read more >>

By Nate McLemore
General Manager, Microsoft Health Solutions Group

PC World article

Halloween @ Microsoft, Redmond, WA.

HAPPPY HALLOWEEN, 2011 FROM MICROSOFT OF REDMOND, WA. !

OPINION: Seattle Times article a "must read" on tolling Initiative 1125 controversy

520 bridge

OPINION:   At the Oct. 4 council meeting Redmond Mayor Marchione  OPPOSED Initiative 1125, as he addressed council before their vote on a Resolution on the initiative:   

"520 is an economic lifeline to the city of Redmond. It's in the direct interests of the City of Redmond and our economic development and our community; and the Resolution be opposed and take the leadership required."

The Redmond City Council majority followed the Mayor and voted AGAINST an endorsement Initiative 1125 (5-2).  Incumbents David Carson and Hank Myers made a political vote FOR the Resolution to endorse Initiative 1125. 

David Carson is challenged by Sue Stewart for Redmond City Council Pos. 7.

According to the TIMES, the Bellevue Chamber of Commerce is AGAINST Initiative 1125 (which is significant in that "one of Bellevue's most prominent businessmen, Kemper Freeman, is the biggest backer of I-1125, contributing more than $1 million to the campaign.).  

SEATTLE TIMES REPORT:  Local News Eyman challenges state's route on tolls Seattle Times Newspaper

By Andrew Garber, 10/1/2011
Seattle Times Olympia bureau

OLYMPIA — Tim Eyman and state officials agree on one thing: His tolling initiative on the November ballot would upend state plans for reducing traffic congestion and financing costly highway construction, including the Highway 520 floating-bridge project.

Eyman says Initiative 1125 would make lawmakers more accountable for raising and spending billions of dollars in tolls, and would make tolling fairer by banning variable-rate tolls that he says hit the state's poorest residents the hardest.

But it also would undermine long-term efforts, state transportation officials say, to find an alternative to gas taxes to help finance highway construction.  READ MORE >> 

Opinion By Bob Yoder
Internet photo - Cascadia

HCL Technologies, Indian Outsourcing Company Opens in Redmond, WA to Significantly Expand its North American Operations

Internet photo

REDMOND NEIGHBORHOOD BLOG COMMENT:  The HCL-Redmond office building is on Northeast 31st Street, near the Azteca restaurant alongside Highway 520. 
 
HCL is a 'near-shore' ET software development company, mostly working for Microsoft.-India.  HCL-Redmond is working close to clients Microsoft (and Boeing) where they can provide direct support and collaboration.  Microsoft and HCL expect to benefit from one or more of the following dimensions of proximity: geographic, temporal (time zone), cultural, linguistic, economic, political, or historical linkages."  

HCL Technologies Opens its Collaborative Engineering Hub in Redmond, WA to Significantly Expand its North American Operations

PRESS RELEASE, September 21, 2011 -- HCL Technologies Opens its Collaborative Engineering Hub in Redmond, WA to Significantly Expand its North American Operations

HCL to Create More Than 400 Jobs in the Greater Seattle Area

"Sunnyvale, Calif. and Redmond, Wash., September 21st, 2011 – HCL Technologies, a leading global IT services company, announced the grand opening of a new state-of-the-art Global Delivery Center in Redmond, Washington. The initial investment of $4 million will create more than 400 jobs in the Seattle area over the next two years. The new center will support HCL's continued global expansion and increased focus on business innovation in software product development, test engineering and business critical platform development.

The Collaborative Engineering Hub will be a strong focal point for HCL’s nearshore complex engineering programs. The opening was inaugurated by the Washington State Director of the Department of Commerce, Rogers Weed, in the presence of Shami Khorana, President of HCL Americas and special guests John Marchione, Mayor of the City of Redmond and Rich Kaplan, Corporate Vice President, Customer and Partner Advocacy at Microsoft. During the event, HCL announced Microsoft as its first official enterprise customer and Director Weed pledged $200,000 from the Workforce Investment Act Fund to HCL to assist with the training of future employees from the Seattle area.  Read More >>

HCL Tech opens delivery centre in Redmond

Business Line : Industry & Economy / Info-tech : HCL Tech opens delivery centre in Redmond:

New Delhi, Sept 22: Indian IT [outsourcing ]services company HCL Technologies has opened a new global delivery centre in Redmond, Washington.

The initial investment of $4 million will create more than 400 jobs in the Seattle area over the next two years, an HCL statement said.

With a 350-seat capacity, the ‘Collaborative Engineering Hub' will be a focal point for HCL's near-shore engineering programs and will provide both engineering and product development services in the areas of internationalisation and mobility.

The centre was inaugurated by the Washington State Director of the Department of Commerce, Mr Rogers Weed, in the presence of officials from HCL and Microsoft.

HCL also announced Microsoft as its first official enterprise customer, and Mr Weed pledged $200,000 from the Workforce Investment Act Fund to HCL to assist with the training of future employees from the Seattle area.

In addition, HCL will work closely with several local universities to recruit graduates, including the University of Washington, University of Washington-Bothell Campus, University of Washington-Tacoma, Seattle University, and Seattle Pacific University.

Internet photo

Redmond Ranked #1 by Forbes for "Cities with the Happiest Young Professionals"

DanitaDelimon.com, News.com SAMMAMISH RIVER TRAIL


"The Cities with the Happiest Young Professionals"
By Jacquelyn Smith
Forbes, September 9, 2011

"Heading the list of the cities with the happiest young professionals, Redmond earned an overall score of 3.835. Workers there expressed the most optimism in the Benefits category, which scored 4.260."

Its list [CareerBliss] of the 20 happiest cities for young professionals is based on analysis from thousands of employee generated reviews between 2010 and 2011. Young professionals, defined by CareerBliss as employees with less than 10 years’ experience in a full-time position, were asked to rate eight factors that affect workplace happiness, including growth opportunities, compensation, benefits, work-life balance, career advancement, senior management, job security and whether they would recommend their employer others.

“In our research, CareerBliss found that young professionals take career happiness very seriously,” says the company’s chief executive, Heidi Golledge. “Typically, they will continue to keep their résumé active on job boards just in case something more fulfilling comes along, and they are typically two to three times more likely than their parents to jump jobs for more career happiness. In short, they take the right to pursuit happiness to heart and will typically not stay at a job with poor conditions for very long, and they will even relocate to get out of an unhappy work environment.”

If you’re looking to move to a happier place, you might consider Redmond, Wash.  Read More >>

UPDATED: Redmond's Evolving Economic Development Plan

Mayor John Marchione
Coordinating economic
development

UPDATED, July 12:  The City of Redmond's Centennial Celebration in 2012 is becoming the rallying point for jump-starting economic
development in the Greater Redmond Community.  Healthy, economic development is deemed critical to the future of the City for job growth, a robust business climate, and quality neighborhoods.   Four community organizations are being re-deployed to fund-raise and move economic and community development forward, as follows:

• "Redmond Economic Development Alliance"  (REDA)
• "Redmond Foundation", now known as "Realize Redmond" (RR).
• "Greater Redmond Chamber of Commerce" (CC)
• "Redmond Lodging Tax Advisory Committee"  (RLTAC)
• Mayor Marchione of the City of Redmond is taking a leadership role in the process.

On May 19, 2009 city council authorized $105,500 payment to Texas-based Angelou Economics "to develop a strategic plan for economic development."  In addition, Council approved $200,000 to create a public-private partnership between the City and REDA.  This "seed money" was intended to jump start REDA fund-raising activities.   During the May public meeting Councilmember Pat Vache' asked council to step off the Dias and extend a hand of partnership and welcome to attending Chamber members.   REDA member, Jim Stanton of Microsoft spent over 15 minutes talking with Chris Hoffmann, the Chamber CEO. The first $50,000 of $200,000 was spent funding the office of Larry Williams, Executive Director, REDA.

Who's in REDA?  Read More >>

June 16 Explosion near Rose Hill - Power outages - Terrible traffic around town

Mike Siegle/Seatle Times

Katie's Facebook photo taken from 200 feet above ground level

 ROLLING NEWS:

Emily's photo sent by Facebook

Scroll down for more photos

See more news and photos at:
Redmond Neighborhood Blog Facebook page  OR Email us at:  redmondblog@gmail.com

ROLLING NEWS:

All power is restored.  PSE, Allison Stanford, ~ 3:46 PM, 6/16

PSE Report:  Mineral oil is used as a coolant and conductor for the substation.  It appears the cause for the  black smoke.  The mineral oil is non-toxic.  A substation fire/explosion has never occurred in the history of Puget Sound Energy.  They've been supplying energy to the region since 1886.
  -- Allison Stanford, PSE spokesperson.  Reported by B. Yoder  4:33PM

Duvall Police, Kirkland Police, and Redmond Police Explorers assisted Redmond Police with initial response and traffic. Kirkland Fire, Redmond Public Works, Redmond Planning, and the Washington Department of Ecology also responded, assuring there was no further damage.
  -- City of Redmond

KING 5:  Redmond Sub-Station Fire Knocks Out Power to 1000's
http://www.king5.com/home/Redmond-WA-substation-fire-knocks-out-power-124022269.html

READ MORE >>

With Facebook’s likes, Bing hopes to become more relevant

With Facebook’s likes, Bing hopes to become more relevant:

"Microsoft’s Bing hopes to use the power of Facebook’s “likes” to help the search engine gain some ground on Google.

Microsoft has launched new features with Facebook that “make it easy to see what people’s Facebook friends like across the Web, incorporate the collective IQ of the Web into their decision-making and conduct conversational searches.”" Read More >>

By Greg Lamm
Tech Flash, 5/16

Redmond will be the first city in the world to adopt new Microsoft Dynamics software for the public sector.

Mayor John Marchione
City of Redmond, WA.

May 14, 2011
Reported by Samantha Pak, Redmond Reporter / Seattle P.I.

"In less than two months, Redmond will be the first city in the world to adopt a new Microsoft software program that will allow employees to do their work more accurately and efficiently......"

"....Bailey [Redmond Director of Finance] said the city is paying $150,000 for the upgrade, whereas full price for the software and implementation for an organization of this size would be between $5 million and $10 million. Although this is a discount at least 97 percent, the time city employees have committed during the last two years has been priceless, he said.

Not only will Dynamics help Redmond operate more efficiently, but other cities and public sectors entities as well once it becomes available." 

Read the entire, unedited article 

Microsoft's Bing took a 30% share of U.S. Web search market in March

Microsoft's Bing took a 30% share of U.S. Web search market in March Technology Los Angeles Times:

"Bing, last month, elbowed its way to a 30% share of the U.S. Web search market, stealing a bit of ground from Google. In March, Bing accounted for 30.01% of the search market, while Google -- still far and away the leader -- took up 64.42% of the market, according to the research firm Experian Hitwise.

Microsoft topping the 30% threshold comes on the heels of a healthy February of 28.48% of the search market. In February, Google had a 66.69% slice of Web search. Bing may have a slight advantage in that it powers Yahoo's search results.

Bing.com searches jumped from 13.49% to 14.32% of the search market in March, while searches at Yahoo.com rose from 14.99% to 15.69%. The traffic increases for Bing, which apparently cost Google a bit, come after Google accused Bing of copying its search results in February. But it would also seem that there is still much room to grow in the search market too. In December, Google said its search traffic from mobile devices rose by 130%."

Los Angeles Times, April 12, 2011
Technology

Bill Gates provides guideposts for nation's governors on education: effective teachers, larger class sizes, charter public schools and no furlough days

Bill Gates addressing National Governor's
Association, February 28, 2011

Bill Gates provides guideposts for nation's governors on education: effective teachers, larger class sizes, charter public schools and no furlough days

March 2, 2011 by Liv Finne

Bill Gates, in Monday’s speech before the National Governor’s Association, offered practical policy changes to improve education within existing revenues. Mr. Gates’ recommendations echo research and recommendations for improving education from Washington Policy Center.

Mr. Gates challenged the view that reducing class size is the best way to improve student achievement. He pointed out that this view has driven school budget increases for more than 50 years, so that today, U.S. schools have almost twice as many teachers per student as they did in 1960. In 1960 the ratio of students to public school employees was 20 to 1; today that ratio is 8 to 1.

Mr. Gates notes that increased staffing and spending have failed to yield the desired results. Student achievement is roughly the same today as it was in 1960. Mr. Gates observed that we have poured money into proxies for improving education, like smaller class sizes, automatic salary increases based on seniority and a pay bump for earning an advanced degree. None of these expenditures has been shown to improve student learning.  Read more >>

Read More >>

Microsoft's Bing gains search engine ground on Google

Microsoft's Bing gains search engine ground on Google:

"Microsoft’s Bing saw its search traffic increase by 5 percent in February, according to Experian Hitwise.

Bing had 13.5 percent of the internet searches in the U.S. in February, according to the latest Hitwise Search Engine Analysis report released today. Bing’s searches grew 21 percent in January.

Google is still the dominate search engine, with nearly 67 percent of searches in the U.S. That is down 2 percent from January, according to Hitwise.

Yahoo had 15 percent of the U.S. searches in February, up 3 percent. The report was first reported by Geekwire.com."

By Greg Lamm
TechFlash, 3/10

Large Metro transit service reductions forecast for 2012 - 2015

Redmond transit but stop

Large Metro transit service reductions are forecast of 2012 - 2015 owing to a drop in sales tax revenues.

During this week's Redmond city council study session some startling statistics for King County's Metro transit were laid out:  

• 62% of Metro's budget is supplied by sales tax
• During 2008 - 2010 sales tax revenue dropped significantly.
• Large service service reductions are forecast for 2012 - 2015.
• A shortfall of 600,000 hours of existing bus service could result in 2012 -2015
• 600,000 lost hours of service is equivalent to all the service provided by Metro buses on the Eastside OR all weekend service in King County.
• Population is expected to increase 42% by 2040 and jobs up by 57%. 
• The average cost per ride is $11-12/ride in King County. In high density areas like Queen Ann service cost drops to ~$2.00/ride.
• King County Metro service hours are approaching 3 million/year.
• King County Metro is in the Top 10 of all transit providers in the country.

Last year, King County Council formed a "Regional Transit Task Force" of thirty members to set-up a policy framework plan for growth and contraction of the Metro transit system.  After seven months of work, the task force recommended new performance measures and follow-up from a 2009 audit.  Social and geographic equity, environmental sustainability, and population density were key factors in their review.

Jim Stanton, Microsoft's representative and member of the Regional Task Force stated bus "transit is an essential public facility" and helps to move 40,000 Microsoft employees to job and education centers.

Mayor John Marchione is a member of the King County Metro Transit Board.

Reported by Bob Yoder
Source:  Redmond City Study Session, 3/8
Internet photo

LWSD Selected to Participate in Microsoft Partners in Learning Innovative Schools Program



Superintendent Chip Kimball

 Lake Washington School District Selected to Participate in Microsoft Partners in Learning Innovative Schools Program

Lake Washington School District joins elite corps of Innovative Schools in more than 46 countries.



Redmond, WA — January 28, 2011 — Yesterday, Microsoft Partners in Learning announced a new class of Pathfinder and Mentor Schools, which will be joining the Innovative Schools Program, part of Microsoft’s 10-year $500M initiative to help teachers and school leaders more effectively use technology as a tool for teaching and learning. Lake Washington School District was chosen after a rigorous global application process and joins a global community of 80 schools in 46 countries. Over the course of the next 12 months, Microsoft will work with educational experts to help the district through a process aimed at creating a community that is focused on innovative teaching and learning practice.

Microsoft's weirdest idea ever? Altered parasites to fight disease

Microsoft's weirdest idea ever? Altered parasites to fight disease:

"We've seen unusual patent applications from Microsoft before, but this one takes things to a whole new level. Under the title of 'Adapting Parasites to Combat Disease,' it describes 'systems and/or methods that facilitate sensing, detecting, logging, or treatment of a condition or need of a living body using a controlled parasite.'

Microsoft isn't commenting, but it's pretty clearly an example of the broad interests (some might say loose focus) of the company's research unit, not an example of the company's actual product plans.

Filed in July 2009 and made public earlier this month, the patent application reads like something out of science fiction" --

 Read more

Story and graphic By Todd Bishop
Techflash Microsoft Blog

Microsoft: Apple can't claim exclusive rights to 'App Store'

Microsoft:  Apple can't claim exclusive rights to 'App Store':

"Microsoft: Apple can't claim exclusive rights to 'App Store'

Should the phrase 'App Store' be Apple's alone?
Microsoft says no, and it's fighting for the right to use those words for its own mobile application store."

Read more >>

Todd Bishop's Microsoft Blog
Tech Flash, 1/11/11
Graphic:  Goggle images

Google opens world's forests for all to see

Google opens world's forests for all to see - ContraCostaTimes.com:

A new Google tool (Earth Engine) will allow users to explore woodland conditions, monitor degradation.
.
With Google's new Earth Engine, anyone will be able to view forest conditions worldwide. When it launches next year, the online tool will provide satellite imagery of forests and will reveal where these woodlands have been razed or degraded by logging.

With Earth Engine, small nations, nonprofit groups, independent researchers and everyone else will be able to assess an environmental crisis of growing magnitude: deforestation".... Read more

By Suzanne Bohan
Contra Costa Times 12/13/2010

Bing grabs search share, rolls out new features amid Google fight

Bing grabs search share, rolls out new features amid Google fight:

Bing remains engaged in a serious battle with Google. And there's some new research indicating that Microsoft's search engine is making a bit of headway -- both in terms of market share and new innovative features.

Bing accounted for 25.27 percent of U.S. Internet searches for the four week period ended November 27th"... Read more

By John Cook
Tech Flash - Todd Bishop's Microsoft Blog
"bing" link added by Yoder