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Microsoft Wants One Billion Devices Running Windows 10 Within Three Years

The company also highlights a bunch of companies doing early work on Windows 10 apps.

Lauren Goode

Although it won’t be released until this summer, Microsoft is setting a bold goal for Windows 10: A billion devices running the new operating system.

“Our goal is within two to three years of Windows 10’s release there will be one billion devices running Windows 10,” Windows unit head Terry Myerson said during the Build conference in San Francisco.

Microsoft also showed off some early Windows 10 partners, including WeChat, Twitter, Netflix and Box.

Myerson also announced new ways of building universal apps for Windows 10, including reusing code written for the Web or Android. Microsoft is also allowing Windows apps to be written using Objective C — a language used to write iOS apps.

Developers will then have the ability to add Windows-specific features on top of the code written for other devices.

It’s a bold move for Microsoft that could make it easier for developers to bring existing apps to Windows. The risk, though, is that developers will simply bring over their iOS and Android code and won’t do the Windows-specific work to make the app truly native, resulting in an app that feels out of place on a Windows device.

Microsoft also gave a name — Microsoft Edge — to the new browser built into Windows 10. It had previously been known as Project Spartan.

After showing a glimpse of its HoloLens project in January, Microsoft went into more detail on Wednesday.

In the most futuristic demo of the day, Microsoft showed how how holographic images can be more than just objects, but actually Windows 10 apps. That means that a video can play, a map can show weather or a Skype call can follow someone as they walk around the house.

Click here for our full liveblog from Wednesday’s keynote.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

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