Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Terry Myerson, executive vice president of Windows and Devices Group, yesterday talked to thousands of developers about the work Microsoft is doing to help them embrace the new era of conversational intelligence and create more personal computing for every customer, industry and business.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and Terry Myerson, executive vice president of Windows and Devices Group, yesterday talked to thousands of developers about the work Microsoft is doing to help them embrace the new era of conversational intelligence and create more personal computing for every customer, industry and business.

Nadella showcased improvements to Cortana and announced previews of new cloud services and toolkits designed to understand the world around us and create intelligent bots. Myerson announced the Windows 10 Anniversary Update, which will deliver significant new innovations for consumers and developers for the Universal Windows Platform.

“As an industry, we are on the cusp of a new frontier that pairs the power of natural human language with advanced machine intelligence,” said Nadella. “At Microsoft, we call this Conversations as a Platform, and it builds on and extends the power of the Microsoft Azure, Office 365 and Windows platforms to empower developers everywhere.”

The Cortana Intelligence Suite, formerly known as the Cortana Analytics Suite, is powered by cutting-edge research into big data, machine learning, perception, analytics and intelligent bots. Built on Microsoft Azure, these capabilities can be used by developers and businesses to create intelligent end-to-end solutions, including new apps that learn about our world and bots and agents that interact with people in personalized, intelligent ways.

Microsoft announced new additions to the Cortana Intelligence Suite, both in preview. The first, Microsoft Cognitive Services, is a collection of intelligence APIs that allows systems to see, hear, speak, understand and interpret our needs using natural methods of communication. The second, the Microsoft Bot Framework, can be used by developers — programming in any language — to build intelligent bots that enable customers to chat using natural language on a wide variety of platforms including text/SMS, Office 365, Skype, Slack, the Web and more.

Microsoft also demonstrated how developers can use services, like those found in the Cortana Intelligence Suite, to transform not only businesses but people’s lives.

“With Windows 10 now running on over 270 million active devices, we’re celebrating with our fans by delivering the Windows 10 Anniversary Update. This significant update will help you interact with your Windows 10 devices as naturally as you interact with the world around you — using your pen, presence and voice,” Myerson said. “We are dedicated to making Windows the most productive development environment for all developers, with all-new capabilities for the Universal Windows Platform and all-new tools for bringing apps to Windows 10 from any platform.”

Windows 10 was designed to deliver more personal computing, with experiences that are more natural, more trusted and extend across devices. With features such as Cortana and Windows Hello, Windows 10 began to deliver on this vision. Today, Windows 10 is off to the fastest start in Windows history with over 270 million active devices, outpacing Windows 7 by 145 per cent. And, customers have spent more time in Windows 10 than ever before — over 75 billion hours since its launch. As a result of this rapidly growing base, Microsoft is seeing new universal apps from Twitter, Uber, King, Disney, Wargaming, Square Enix, Yahoo and WWE; with new apps on the way from Bank of America, Starbucks, Facebook, Messenger and Instagram. The Windows Store has seen over five billion visits as Windows fans are discovering apps for Windows 10, including nearly 1,000 Cortana apps.