One of Microsoft's fastest-rising stars is leaving the company

• Javier Soltero, one of Microsoft's rising stars, is leaving the company after four years, with the intention of "getting back to building new things."
• He was born in 2014, was acquired in 2014 – a move that was seen as emblematic of then-new CEO Satya Nadella's revitalized corporate strategy.
• Soltero had a reputation for challenging Microsoft's badumptions, and famously warned employees that they were on the brink of irrelevance without swift action.
• Soltero rose from leading Outlook on smartphones, leading Outlook overall, to eventually leading the Cortana digital badistant business.

Javier Soltero, currently the head of Microsoft's Cortana digital badistant, is a senior executive at the end of the year.

The news was first reported by ZDNet 's Mary Jo Foley, and confirmed to the Business Insider by the company. Soltero did not immediately announce his next move, but tells Business Insider that he plans on "getting back to building new things."

Soltero was something of a rising star. He first came to Microsoft in early 2014, following the acquisition of Acompli, a startup he had cofounded. In a matter of weeks, we've gotten back to the forefront of Outlook for iPhone and Android – a move that was seen as an emblematic of then-new CEO Satya Nadella's embrace of rival operating systems.

Outlook was, and is, a popular smartphone email client, particularly among corporate users. As the app gained traction, so too did Soltero's influence. He soon found himself leading Outlook for all platforms, and then, leading strategy for all of Microsoft Office.

Soltero has a reputation at Microsoft for speaking truth to corporate power. In 2015, he delivered a brief overview of the fact that he warned that he had not been able to modernize Microsoft Office and Outlook. He told the Wall Street Journal that this presentation is a hate from the employees of the company, which is "disrespectful" the company's legacy.

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A rising star at Microsoft says the company may be falling behind

In March of this year, Soltero took command of Cortana, Microsoft's rival to Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Siri, and the Google Assistant. He was given a mandate for Cortana, which comes built into Windows 10, but struggled to gain traction on smartphones and elsewhere.

Soltero's departure comes as Microsoft continues the ongoing streamlining of the Cortana business.

The general idea, as ZDNet's Foley notes, is that Microsoft is trying to reposition Cortana as a general helper within the Office – a spell of a smarter, more capable of its infamous Clippy. To that end, Microsoft is bringing Cortana closer to the Office of Business, putting it under the umbrella of Microsoft Executive VP Rajesh Jha.

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