Another senior Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) vet is leaving the company… Jeff Raikes, who joined the company in 1981, steps down as president of the business division at the end of January and will retire in September. He’ll be succeeded by new hire Stephen Elop, former COO of Juniper Networks. As president, he’ll run the Information Worker, Microsoft Business Solutions and Unified Communications businesses; Server and Tools head Bob Muglia now will report directly to CEO Steve Ballmer. (The business division has annual revenues of more than $16 billion.) In addition to Juniper, Elop was president and CEO of Macromedia when it was sold to Adobe (NSDQ: ADBE). then joined Adobe as president of world-wide field operations runing the global sales org and all customer-facing businesses. Release.

WSJ: “The hiring adds another operations specialist to the mix of people who could possibly run Microsoft in the future. Over the past several years Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer has tried to fill out Microsoft’s top ranks with outsiders, some of whom with grooming might succeed him some day.”