Microsoft is splitting the development of Internet Explorer into two groups.

• Group one will be dealing with the current internet explorer as is, upgrading it in a similar fashion to how they are now.
• Group two will be working on a project named 'Spartan', which is there attempt at cutting out all of the legacy code and crap, while making it a faster, better user experience.

Again, Internet Explorer isn't being killed of, they will just have a 'better' browser experiment. Frankly I'm really hopeful for Spartan. Chrome used to be the lightweight and fast browser but it's turned into a memory whoring clunky program.