Q&A: Microsoft's Linux strategist Martin Taylor, Part 2

Computerworld - Martin Taylor recently marked his one-year anniversary as Microsoft Corp.'s chief Linux strategist. Taylor, whose official title is general manager of platform strategy, recently spoke with Computerworld about his first year in that job. This is Part 2 of the interview. Part 1 is available online.
For what server workloads have you noted the most activity around Linux? The biggest uptake on Linux has been in the Web server workload. We also have seen on the [application platform] workload the Unix scenario. Meta [Group] recently did a survey of 24 IT professionals and business decision-makers who moved from SAP or PeopleSoft on Unix to Windows. They found about [a] 50% in aggregate decrease in number of servers needed, 50% savings in administrative cost and cost of ownership, and about 25% increase in their abilities -- reliability, scalability, availability. One of the reasons we asked Meta to go talk [to users] before we go spin up a lot of activities in the coming year [is] I need something to really help me understand. ... "What's our value prop there? Do people really see benefit? How do we win over these Unix people that don't want to do Windows? Are there real hard-core cost savings?"
Do you view your job now as making sure that people plotting a switch of operating systems include Microsoft in the discussion? Yeah. It's interesting. That's not my sole job. But I think that one of the things that I want to do a lot more this year is say, "Hey, you're on Unix today. You should at least give Windows a look."
How are you finding those people? Many times when some of the decisions are taken, the Microsoft guys aren't even there at all, partly because we have a culture coming from the desktop and low-end servers. Then to have that enterprise high-end discussion, we're just not always even invited. But one way to do it is through partners. Companies like Unisys that have enterprise credibility, that are working with those data centers today, they can say, "Hey, let's consider Microsoft for this solution, at least look at them both before we make that a blind move." That's where I think we have a huge opportunity with some of our partnerships.
Which Linux loss bothered you the most? It depends on how you define a loss. If it's a specific opportunity, I don't feel good about Munich mostly because it keeps coming up. I'm like, "Can we just say, fine, it happened and we're onto