Microsoft's Kevin Gallo talks about how the company is trying to undo the divide between UWP and Win32, future of Microsoft's app store, and more
Mary Jo Foley / ZDNet :
Context & Ripple Effects
This interview sits mid-way through a long reversal. Back in 2015, Microsoft execs framed unifying its platforms around a single modern app model — the approach that produced UWP and made the Microsoft Store the gatekeeper for packaged apps. By May 2019, Kevin Gallo is telling Mary Jo Foley the company is working to undo the UWP/Win32 divide, an implicit admission that the unified-platform bet didn't win developers over.
The follow-through came fast: weeks later Microsoft said Win32 games could enter the Microsoft Store, dropping the UWP requirement that had defined the store since launch — and by 2021 sources described a full Store revamp welcoming unpackaged Win32 apps and third-party commerce platforms. Gallo's comments are the strategic hinge between those two states.
First-order effects
- Windows developers get a signal they no longer need to commit to UWP packaging or the Store's commerce rules to be first-class citizens on Windows 10, easing the porting burden that had kept major desktop apps out of the Store.
- For the Microsoft Store itself, the catalog constraint lifts: the games and desktop apps that defined PC software but sat outside UWP become candidates for store distribution.
Second-order effects
- Accepting Win32 into the Store puts it in direct catalog competition with established PC game storefronts rather than competing only as a UWP-only venue — and once unpackaged Win32 apps arrive, as the 2021 revamp reports suggest, Microsoft's own 15% style take on store transactions becomes negotiable pressure, with third-party commerce platforms letting devs route payments elsewhere.
- Xbox-side tooling already shared with Store games, per the February 2019 analysis of Xbox One installation tools, gives Microsoft a way to keep PC and console experiences converging even as the app model underneath loosens.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, Windows reverts structurally to an open platform where the Store is an optional discovery and billing layer rather than a gatekeeper — the opposite of the mobile-style walled garden the 2015 unification push implied, and a model other OS vendors' stores would find harder to justify charging premium commissions against.
The trend: Microsoft is dismantling its own app-store gatekeeping on Windows, trading UWP exclusivity for developer reach as the price of keeping the Store relevant.