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The account covers the company's entire consumer and business software portfolio, as well as its MSN service.

Universal Interactive's remit is to handle digital planning, buying, tracking, email marketing and to develop strategic partnerships and revenue streams.

Microsoft brand communications group manager Charles Eales said the firm had been reluctant to hand Universal Interactive the online task until now because the two-year-old agency was in its relative infancy, but now felt confident doing so.

Media Contacts held the online media account for more than six years. The software company has retained AKQA as its lead digital creative agency.

Universal Interactive is already responsible for the online media account for Microsoft's Xbox console. The firm dropped Bartle Bogle Hegarty as its European ad agency for Xbox in April, moving the account to its main agency, McCann-Erickson.

Microsoft is expected to launch a huge ad campaign this autumn to support the latest version of its flagship Office consumer product suite. Called Microsoft Office System, it will be the successor to Office XP, which launched alongside Windows XP in August 2001.

The company revamped Office's four-piece puzzle logo recently with a so-called 'transformer' logo to convey the wide array of applications in the next version of Office.

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