What motivated Microsoft to acquire GitHub?

This question aims to gauge your awareness of trends and key occurrences in the technology sector, particularly in software development. One notable event is Microsoft's acquisition of GitHub. The interviewer is interested in whether you understand the reasoning behind this decision. When responding, keep in mind Microsoft's perspective and highlight the advantages this acquisition provided, such as enhancing their developer tools and services and tapping into a dynamic user community.

Microsoft's acquisition of GitHub aligns well with its shift towards open source and its engagement with the broader developer community. To begin with, GitHub hosts over 28 million developers who collaborate on code, establishing it as the most popular code repository globally. Additionally, Microsoft is aggressively promoting Azure, its cloud platform, which stands in competition with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud. By acquiring GitHub, Microsoft gains direct insights and access to the expertise and code of top developers worldwide, enabling them to enhance and integrate the necessary tools for competing in the cloud market.

Historically, Microsoft has been a software company primarily centered on selling proprietary, closed-source software. However, in recent years, it has been transitioning towards open source. The acquisition of GitHub, the world's largest source code hosting platform with over 40 million users, aligns perfectly with this shift. This move positions Microsoft at the core of the open-source development community. Additionally, it enables them to more closely integrate their existing services and tools, such as Visual Studio and Azure, with GitHub, potentially drawing those millions of developers to their platform and technologies.