Kevin Turner, Microsoft's Chief Operating Officer, told partners during his Worldwide Partner Conference keynote that Microsoft plans to open its first retail stores this fall. Some of them will be deliberately located near a certain other company's retail stores: "And stay tuned, because we're going to have some retail stores opened up that are opened up right next door to Apple stores," said Turner, according to ZDNet.
The timing is good: Windows 7 is being launched on October 22, 2009, and Microsoft will of course want to offer the operating system in its own stores. Turner again emphasized that Microsoft would be sharing what it learns from its retail stores with its partners.
The rumor of Microsoft retail stores first surfaced�in April 2008. When the online Microsoft Store expanded to the US in November 2008, some believed that's what all the hubbub had been about.
In February 2009, however, the software giant announced that it was planning to roll out Microsoft-branded retail stores; Microsoft also announced David Porter as corporate vice president of Retail Stores, who would report Turner. Porter's first task was to define the timeframe, locations, and specifics for the Microsoft-branded retail stores. We know the first one of the three, so the wait begins for the other two.
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