Microsoft chief software architect Ray Ozzie's plan to step down, pronounced yesterday by CEO Steve Ballmer, marks an end to an era of greatness which saw the company steer in cloud computing and at the same time develop Windows Azure.

The reasons behind stepping down of Ozzie are unclear. Ballmer wrote only that Ozzie will "remain with the company as he transitions the teams and ongoing strategic projects within his organization" and that he will "be onboard for a while." During that time, Ozzie will also focus on Microsoft's entertainment-related businesses, wrote Ballmer.

It seems that there are no plans to substitute Ozzie and the repercussions for the same are something of a concern for most of the industry experts.

Industry analysts believe that Ozzie had an important role in Microsoft's shift toward cloud computing. Ozzie's "Internet Services Disruption memo" from 2005 is a platform to offer more advertising-supported services and software. The resulting products comprise of Windows Live services, online versions of Exchange and SharePoint, Office Web Apps and, of course, the Windows Azure platform-as-a-service.

Ozzie's exit is now being considered to be a meek effort at trying to replace Bill Gates.