‘Less hair, same love’: Satya Nadella reacts to his 32-year-old Microsoft Excel demo going viral
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella reacted to an old video in which he gave a presentation on how Excel works. Nadella responded to the 1993 clip, saying that he still maintains his love for Microsoft Excel, even though the software was introduced in 1985.
A user on X shared a video of Nadella from 1993, when he was the Technical Marketing Manager at the software giant. In response, Nadella shared a photo of himself in front of the monitor with the Excel application open.
Nadella also wore a hoodie that read “Make Sheet Happen Since 1985.”
“Less hair. My love for Excel remains the same!” wrote the Microsoft CEO in response to the viral post.
Nadella, then 26, appeared in a video of Microsoft’s DevCast call show. During the program, a clip of which went viral, Nadella demonstrated how to integrate data from an IBM AS/400 mainframe into Excel using Windows NT.
Microsoft’s new AI features for Excel
Since the rise of generative AI, Microsoft has been constantly adding new AI features to Excel and other Office products to make it easier for users to get work done with these applications.
The tech giant recently added Microsoft Copilot to Excel, which allows users to create and understand formulas, analyze data for insights, highlight data, create custom filters, and even add new columns and rows.
Just a few days ago, Microsoft added Agent Mode to Excel, which allows users to plan, execute, and iterate multi-step tasks using natural language prompts via Copilot.
Satya Nadella talks about his love for Excel
When asked about Excel’s lasting legacy in a recent podcast, Nadella said, “I think it’s the power of lists and tables. It’s just brilliant.”
“It’s a blank canvas. It’s always going to be there. You can add a lot of bells and whistles to it, the same goes for spreadsheets,” Nadella added.
Netizens reacted to Nadella’s post
Reacting to Nadella’s post, a user said, “If Elon Musk can go from bald to having hair (the same goes for Pavel Durov, why can’t you?”)
“Everyone is an Excel lover until they have to deal with circular logic,” another user added.
Meanwhile, an Excel fan commented, “Hair comes, hair goes, Excel is permanent.”
