Background

Hotmail was one of the worls first web-based email services. Founded back in 1996 by Sabeer Bhatia and Jack Smith, it was purchased by Microsoft in 1997 for a reported $400 million fee. Hotmail today has unlimited storage, a far cry from the 2MB limit when it launched. In addition Hotmail provides integration between Microsoft's Windows Live Messenger and Skydrive applications. Hotmail is available in 36 different languages and currently has around 369 millions active users worldwide.