Another of the Microsoft old guard moves on

While the the Microsoft depature upon which most company watchers focused this week was that of Bruce Jaffe — the former Mergers & Acquisitions Chief — another Microsoft veteran is moving on, as well.

Charles Fitzgerald, Microsoft’s General Manager of Platform Strategy, is leaving the company to join a startup.

Fitzgerald was Microsoft’s primary spokesperson for Microsoft Java back in 1996. Ever since, he’s been helping Microsoft position itself against its enterprise competitors. On Fitzgerald’s Platformonomics blog, he skewered regularly IBM, Sun, Oracle, Google and other Microsoft competitors.