Microsoft’s turnaround could have started sooner: opinion

Signage is displayed outside the Microsoft Corp. main campus in Redmond, Washington, U.S., on Tuesday, Dec. 19, 2017. In the race to commercialize a new type of powerful computer, Microsoft has just pulled up to the starting line with a slick-looking set of wheels. The Redmond, Washington-based tech giant is competing with Alphabet Inc.'s Google, International Business Machines Corp. and a clutch of small, specialized companies to develop quantum computers – machines that, in theory, will be many times more powerful than existing computers by bending the laws of physics. Photographer: David Ryder/Bloomberg

The Microsoft antitrust trial, which will have its 20th anniversary this fall, began with the legal equivalent of shock and awe. 

To the surprise of everyone in the courtroom, the government’s trial lawyer, David Boies, decided to use video clips of Bill Gates’s deposition as part of his opening statement.