Unlimited Potential Programs

Microsoft Unlimited Potential is an umbrella brand for a wide range of Microsoft products and programs that aid education, job development, and job training in economically underdeveloped regions.

The company has an Unlimited Potential product group, which is responsible for creating products that serve underdeveloped countries, such as the Starter Editions of Windows, and the FlexGo program, which lets users in some markets use prepaid cards for computer time on home PCs. However, the term Unlimited Potential also encompasses many programs overseen by other groups within Microsoft.

The company first began using the term in the early 2000s to refer to a set of programs under which it donated cash, software, and other resources for technology training and education. In 2008, the company refined the definition: the goal of Unlimited Potential is to bring technology resources to the approximately 5 billion people around the world who don’t have access today. In the short-term, Unlimited Potential hopes to reach 1 billion additional people by 2015, by focusing on three areas: