About Jeff Raikes

As group vice president responsible for Microsoft North America business, Jeff Raikes manages and directs Sales and Consulting Services for the U.S. and Canada. He is also responsible for four of Microsoft's customer units, focused on the needs of education customers, enterprise customers, small and medium organizations, and individual end users. Each of these units provide worldwide leadership on strategies, policies and programs and they integrate the activities of Microsoft's sales and service partners with the needs of the Microsoft customers in these customer segments. Prior to his promotion to the Executive Committee in July 1996, Raikes was senior vice president of Microsoft North America since 1992.

Raikes joined Microsoft in 1981 as a product manager. He was instrumental in driving Microsoft's applications marketing strategy. Promoted to director of applications marketing in 1984, he was the chief strategist behind Microsoft's success in both applications for the Macintosh and word processing software for MS-DOS based systems. He drove the product strategy and design of Microsoft Office, the industry's leading application productivity suite. Raikes was then promoted to vice president of Office Systems, where he was responsible for development and marketing of word processing, workgroup applications, and pen computing. Prior to joining Microsoft, he was a Software Development Manager at Apple Computer, Inc.

Raikes holds a bachelor of science degree in engineering-economics from Stanford University. He has been a member of the Software Publishers Association since 1987, served on the board of directors from 1987-1993, and twice served as the chairman of the board. Raikes is currently on the board of the Washington Technology Center.

A native of Nebraska, Raikes is a member of the University of Nebraska Foundation. He is involved with numerous community activities, focusing on education and children's issues.