In a surprising move, Microsoft has today announced that it has joined the Linux Foundation as a Platinum member.
Things seems to have taken a 360 degree turn as about 15 years ago, Microsoft’s former CEO Steve Ballmer dubbed Linux as ‘Cancer’. “Linux is a cancer that attaches itself in an intellectual property sense to everything it touches.” – he said back in 2001 in an interview. 
However, Microsoft has evolved a lot under current CEO, Satya Nadella. In recent times, Microsoft has been adopting open source projects a lot. In fact it is one of the top organisation to have contributed on Github. Also, the Redmont based company had earlier released the open source .NET Core 1.0. Further, Microsoft has also built Canonical’s Ubuntu distribution into Windows 10. Not only this, it also brought SQL Server to Linux and has also collaborated with Red Hat, SUSE and many more.
Jim Zemlin, Executive Director of The Linux Foundation said in a Press Release – “Microsoft has grown and matured in its use of and contributions to open source technology. The company has become an enthusiastic supporter of Linux and of open source and a very active member of many important projects. Membership is an important step for Microsoft, but also for the open source community at large, which stands to benefit from the company’s expanding range of contributions.”
On the other hand, Scott Guthrie, Executive Vice President, Microsoft Cloud and Enterprise Group quoted in a Press Release – “The Linux Foundation is home not only to Linux, but many of the community’s most innovative open source projects. We are excited to join The Linux Foundation and partner with the community to help developers capitalize on the shift to intelligent cloud and mobile experiences.”