After working at Microsoft for over 7 years as an employee and almost 5 years before that as a contractor/vendor, I’ve decided it’s time for me to do become independent and start my own company. My official last day at Microsoft is July 18th. I’ve enjoyed all the years working at Microsoft since the early 90s, especially with great people making many friends along the way.

I will continue be involved with Microsoft plus other technologies, attending various developer/technology events, and being active in the communities in general. I’m very enthusiastic about the developer community growth around extending Visual Studio and the plans Microsoft has around upcoming versions of the VS SDK as well as various community member projects recently started. I plan to attend the VSX Developers Conference this September in Redmond and I’m looking forward to talking to many VSX developers and VSIP members there.

My new company is called MashupX, new blog is at http://mashupx.com/blog/, and new email address is klevy@mashupx.com. I will be blogging about my startup company activities, travel, gadgets, movies, and technology in general. I’ll post more details on my blog later this month, so check there soon for more details.