Microsoft scoops up Windows apps maker

Microsoft on Tuesday said it has bought Winternals Software, a small maker of Windows utility programs, in a deal the software behemoth hopes will add key technical talent to its operating system development team.

As part of the deal, the software maker is naming Winternals co-founder Mark Russinovich as a technical fellow. Among the software Winternals offers is a set of freely downloadable tools known as Sysinternals.

Jim Allchin, Microsoft divisional co-president, said in a statement: "I've had my eye on Mark for some time. The work he and Bryce [Cogswell, Winternal's other co-founder] have completed in system recovery and data protection illustrates the depth of thinking and skill they will bring to future versions of Windows. The addition of their deep kernel-level expertise to our existing strong talent will help provide us with the edge we need to continue to raise the quality and functionality bar for Windows on both the client and the server."

In buying Winternals, Microsoft is getting the company's free tools, its Sysinternals community website as well as several paid-for software products for businesses. However, it appears Microsoft made the deal, in large part, to hire the company's two co-founders.

Platform and Services division architect Jason Garms said in a telephone interview on Tuesday: "It's definitely about talent. Mark is one of the top five or 10 people in the world when it comes to Windows internals."

Garms said Russinovich will be focused on helping Microsoft further develop the Windows kernel in his role as technical fellow - the top technical position at Microsoft with less than two dozen people holding such title. Co-founder Cogswell will become a software architect in the Windows Component Platform Team.

Microsoft has seen its ability to quickly ready new versions of its flagship operating system wane in recent years. Windows Vista, the successor to Windows XP, will come more than five years after its predecessor, which launched in October 2001. Following several delays, Microsoft is currently hoping to wrap up development work on Vista this year in time for a January launch.

Russinovich said in a statement he is excited to join the company whose technologies are so critical to so many businesses. "I witness regularly the profound impact that even a few lines of code can have in a world of globally connected systems," he said.

Microsoft said it is still exploring how best to integrate Winternals' products. Winternals' Recovery Manager, for example, has some similarities to the System Center Data Protection Manager tool that Microsoft released in September 2005. Garms said: "We're evaluating how those would meet together."

As for the Sysinternals blog, the company wants to keep the community information, blogs, forums and tools but Garms said Microsoft is looking at how the site might be integrated into other Microsoft efforts "so that it's not quite so separate".

Terms of the deal were not announced.

Ina Fried writes for CNET News.com