Who Is Julie Larson-Green, Microsoft's New Windows Boss? [VIDEO]

[brightcove video="1967200414001" /]

Microsoft shocked the tech world this week when it announced the immediate departure of Steven Sinofsky, the company's president of Windows, who oversaw the development and recent launch of Windows 8. With Sinofsky gone, the Windows ship now officially has a new captain: Julie Larson-Green. So who is she?

Like Sinofsky before her, Larson-Green is a career Microsoftie. She started at the company in 1993 and was "discovered" when she gave a talk about Microsoft compilers, writes longtime Microsoft observer Mary Jo Foley. Her first role at the company involved working on developer tools, but she soon joined the Internet Explorer team.

It was her work with Microsoft Office that has had the most impact, though. Larson-Green started with Office in 1997, eventually leading the redesign for the 2007 edition. She fully backed the "ribbon" interface in that release, which introduced a string of icons across the top of the screen. Before her promotion to Windows lead, she was corporate vice president of program management for Windows.

Now she's the boss, but what will that mean for the future of Windows? In the short term, not much: Windows 8 launched just two weeks ago, and Microsoft will be focused more on marketing than development for a while. When she does get a chance to leave her mark on Windows, it likely won't involve a ribbon.