> Kinect was invented by an Israeli company before being bought out by Microsoft.

No. The sensor was developed by PrimeSense.

However, the key part of Kinect is the software, which was based on machine learning work done at Microsoft Research.

MSR is somewhat infamous for developing all sorts of whiz-bang prototypes that never make it to market. Kinect was an exception.

As for who convinced Anders Hejlsberg to jump ship, that was Bill Gates. He was still CEO of Microsoft in 1996.

C# yes, but claiming .NET (aka COM+ Runtime, the CLR, Project 7, all that stuff) is his is a slight overstatement.

Generics, one of the CLR's major distinguishing features over the JVM, came entirely from MSR, at considerable resistance from MS Corp.

Just a minor correction: Mads Torgesen was never in MSR.