Satya Nadella Has Microsoft In The AI Driver's Seat

by Wade Tyler Millward, CRN

When World Wide Technology's Jim Kavanaugh attended Microsoft's high-profile CEO Summit this spring, one major thing stood out to him: Microsoft Chairman and CEO Satya Nadella's "absolutely brilliant and unique" ability to be both a technology innovator and a sales leader in the AI era.

"Sometimes you have people that are visionary, but they are only visionary and don't have the ability to execute," said Kavanaugh, CEO of WWT, the $20 billion St. Louis-based global solution provider powerhouse. "Then sometimes you have people that are really good at executing, but they're not necessarily great at the vision. Satya can do both."

Nadella can paint the big picture and get into the details when it comes to execution, Kavanaugh said.

With hundreds of thousands of Microsoft partners behind him to lead his AI revolution, Nadella is the No. 1 Most Influential Executive on CRN's 2024 Top 100 Executives list.

From Nadella revving Microsoft's AI innovation engine to new heights to his decision to invest billions into AI superstar OpenAI, his vision and ability to successfully execute on that vision make him "stand out of from the crowd" of IT leaders fighting for AI market share, Kavanaugh said.

Kavanaugh highlighted Microsoft's momentum around Copilot innovation, built-in generative AI capabilities in its applications, and its Azure cloud infrastructure hosting many of the world's leading AI products as just a few reasons why he expects the company will continue to be an AI market leader for the long run.

"Microsoft has both the platform—their software is embedded in just about every enterprise when you talk about these Copilot capabilities—and they also have the cloud. So when you're writing prompts to ChatGPT, it's being hosted in Azure," said Kavanaugh.

"It's an absolutely visionary company with a visionary leader that isn't just visionary but does an amazing job of execution. … I have an incredible respect for him."