Coming back from the 2013 MVP Summit, I am very excited and anxiously waiting for the new generation of Windows Embedded products, to be release…  Very soon!

If you are not part of this group, the MVP acronym may not have any meaning. MVP is short for Most Valuable Professional, a Microsoft program started 20 years ago to recognize technology professional who share their passion, technical expertise and Microsoft product knowledge to the community.  This year marks the 20^th anniversary for the MVP program.

Microsoft hosts the annual MVP Summit and invites MVP from all over the World to interact with product team.  During the Summit, MVPs are able to provide feedback to Microsoft product teams to address known issues and opportunities to connect with other MVPs from different region of the World.

Future outlook for technology professional focusing on Microsoft products are tremendous.  For the first time, application development for Windows client (which include Windows 8 and Windows RT), Windows server, Windows Azure, Windows Live, Windows Phone, Microsoft Office products, Windows Mobile, Windows Embedded and broad range of Web and Enterprise application, are supported by the same Visual Studio 2012 IDE.

Visual Studio 2012 provides tremendous opportunities for Windows Embedded developers to capture new projects, and opportunities for existing Visual Studio developers to enter the “embedded development” domain.

For decades, embedded development has been a black art accessible by small community of “low-level” developers.  With Windows Embedded, it’s no longer the case.  Started in Visual Studio 2005, it’s possible to develop Windows Embedded application, targeting real-life embedded devices, in managed code using C# or Visual Basic.

Embedded devices and systems are all around us.  As part of our daily living, each of us interacts with multiple embedded devices throughout the day…   Think about the self-serve check-out at the market, bank ATM machines, self-serve gas pump, ticketing machine at the airport/movie-theatre, sprinkler control system, remote control for the garage/TV/Car, access control, gaming console, TV-Audio entertainment system, navigation system for our car, credit card processing terminal, information kiosk, point-of-sale terminal, medical devices, industrial-automation devices, utility metering, smart-grid, smart-sensors, robotics and the list go on and on…  Think about the development opportunities behind each of these vertical markets.

Some pictures from the 2013 MVP Summit:

Windows Embedded MVPs at the Welcome Reception on Monday night.

Our MVP lead:  Dora Chan