Microsoft Corporation announced that Dr. HOU Yang will succeed Alain Crozier to lead Microsoft’s Global Sales, Marketing and Operations organization in the Greater China Region (GCR). Alain Crozier’s will continue to lead Microsoft Greater China till July 1.
A proven transformational leader
Crozier worked as Chairman and CEO of Microsoft GCR since 2016, transforming the business to deliver first-class cloud services to customers, helping them transform their own businesses for the new world of the intelligent cloud and intelligent edge.

Ahmed Mazhari, President for Microsoft Asia said,
“I want to thank Alain for his leadership delivering transformational growth in a very complex market over the past five years. HOU Yang is a proven transformational leader, bringing strong technology industry ecosystem partner development capabilities as well as local insight to enable customers. He is an experienced business leader across operations, product optimization and sales with a track record in partner and customer engagement. He brings a balanced combination of strategic thinking and execution discipline, that delivered outsized growth.”
Alain’s successor, Dr. HOU Yang, comes to Microsoft from Qualcomm where he served for 8 years in both the US and in China, most recently as Senior Vice President of the Semiconductor business – Qualcomm’s largest revenue generator in China. Prior to Qualcomm, he spent five years at McKinsey as a leader in their tech practice, based in the US.