miketorres
Mike Torres

Mike Torres, who helped to build and lead Microsoft’s SkyDrive consumer cloud and file storage service, is leaving to join Amazon as a director in the Seattle company’s digital group — the area of Amazon responsible for the Kindle product lineup.

Torres, who was a group program manager for SkyDrive, confirmed the move this afternoon in response to an inquiry from GeekWire. He has left Microsoft and starts at Amazon in a couple weeks.

“While it was a very tough decision to leave Microsoft, I simply couldn’t pass up this opportunity to be part of such an incredibly exciting new initiative for Amazon,” he wrote in a message, saying that he wasn’t able to disclose any more details about what he’ll be doing for Amazon.

He’s the second Microsoft veteran in recent months to publicly acknowledge being hired by Amazon for an undisclosed project. Charlie Kindel, a former Windows Phone general manager who left Microsoft to launch his own startup, was hired by Amazon in April to work on “something secret.”

Kindel wrote on his LinkedIn profile at the time, “I’m building a new team going after a totally new area for Amazon. I’m hiring cloud and mobile developers and testers, program managers, and product managers.”

Torres’ departure comes as Microsoft works to weave SkyDrive into more of its consumer services as a back-end file storage and synchronization service across Windows 8, Windows Phone and devices such as the Microsoft Surface tablet.

Like what you're reading? Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletters to catch every headline

Job Listings on GeekWork

Find more jobs on GeekWork. Employers, post a job here.