Downtown Toronto plays host to 15,000 Microsofties this week for the yearly Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference taking place from July 8-12 at the Rogers Centre and the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Toronto is expected to earn upwards of $50 million for hosting the conference according to Tourism Toronto.
This is a particularly significant conference for Microsoft which is slated to launch the Windows 8 operating system. Windows 8 is coming this Fall. The new OS has been redesigned from the ground up for multi-touch operation and will run on tablets that can double as full-featured PCs. Windows 8 will be offered as a $40.00 upgrade to users of Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7. This high profile conference may generate more interest in Toronto as a world class convention city for the technology sector.