The font used in the logo is called Segoe, a thinner type than that used in the old logo and the same as the one used in the Windows 8 logo. The accompanying Windows symbol in red, green, yellow and blue is a squared off version of the old Windows flag symbol that had wavy horizontal and vertical lines, says the company's head of brand strategy, Jeff Hansen, in the Official Microsoft Blog.

The revamp goes hand-in-hand with Microsoft's big gamble on touch-centric Windows 8, the new operating system scheduled to be released in October. The operating system embraces a clean look with focus on text rather than graphics, modeled after public-transportation signage. This is what the company had called Metro, but it has dropped the name.