So if you didn’t already know that SharePoint was “big,” Microsoft announced that it is now a $1 billion (with a “b”) business!  Wow.  After 18 months of v3/2007, I’d say that rocks!  Microsoft also claims that there are already 100 million licenses sold, though I’m quite skeptical about how that number was determined, given that the same announcement mentions 17,000 businesses using SharePoint.  My guess is that the 17,000 number (which is impressive in its own right since, according to Microsoft, it is actual “in use” deployments) is the one to watch, and that the 100 million number is some voodoo related to Software Assurance or Vista or some kind of “included” license.  100 million licenses—that suggests 1 out of every 50-60 people on the planet have a license to SharePoint. Hmmm…

Not to detract from how big SharePoint really is, however, and how much people are spending on the platform.  Case in point:  Microsoft’s SharePoint conference for IT Pros this week drew in the neighborhood of 4,000 attendees.  The last two TechEd events drew roughly 10,000 to 15,000 attendees and that included developers and IT Pros across all Microsoft technologies. It’s clear where the focus is right now!  It’s going to be a great year!