Microsoft has announced its next Chief Executive Officer this morning.

In a press release, the company has revealed that the Board of Directors have selected Satya Nadella to fill the role. Nadella was previously the Executive Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise group. He will become the CEO and join the Board of Directors effective immediately.

“During this time of transformation, there is no better person to lead Microsoft than Satya Nadella,” said Bill Gates, Microsoft’s Founder and Member of the Board of Directors. “Satya is a proven leader with hard-core engineering skills, business vision and the ability to bring people together. His vision for how technology will be used and experienced around the world is exactly what Microsoft needs as the company enters its next chapter of expanded product innovation and growth.” 

Nadella will take over the position previously held by Steve Ballmer who announced in August that he would step down as the CEO of Microsoft once the company found his successor.

“Having worked with him for more than 20 years, I know that Satya is the right leader at the right time for Microsoft,” said Ballmer. “I’ve had the distinct privilege of working with the most talented employees and senior leadership team in the industry, and I know their passion and hunger for greatness will only grow stronger under Satya’s leadership.”

Nadella has been with the company since 1992 and has overseen many technical shifts such as the company's move to cloud storage and development of the cloud storage.

In another company shift, Gates announced that he would step away as Chairman of the Board of Directors and would assume a new role as on the Board as Founder and Technology Advisor. John Thompson, lead independent director for the Board of Directors, will assume the role of Chairman of the Board of Directors while still maintaining his role as an independent director of the Board.

Nadella also took time today to address his employees about his future role with the company.

"I am here for the same reason I think most people join Microsoft — to change the world through technology that empowers people to do amazing things." said Nadella in a company email. "I believe over the next decade computing will become even more ubiquitous and intelligence will become ambient. The coevolution of software and new hardware form factors will intermediate and digitize — many of the things we do and experience in business, life and our world. This will be made possible by an ever-growing network of connected devices, incredible computing capacity from the cloud, insights from big data, and intelligence from machine learning."