I think Microsoft's biggest innovation was not a thing but a process, and it that served them very well for most of their history. Namely "fast follow" - the ab

I think Microsoft's biggest innovation was not a thing but a process, and it that served them very well for most of their history. Namely "fast follow" - the ability to take a competitor's product and very quickly produce their own, better version. DOS, Windows 3, Word, Excel, MSVC++, Internet Explorer, etc. etc. Windows 7 seems noticeably absent from the list of stuff the R&D department produced.