The Microsoft High-Profile Exodus Continues

snydeq writes "Bing principal Scott Prevost is the latest of several high-profile exits from Microsoft in the wake of Bob Muglia's departure, causing some to question the long-term outlook for Redmond, InfoWorld reports. While the departures have spanned the company's business divisions, the concern centers square on the Microsoft core: 'Microsoft's numbers are looking good in the short term, but the future of core products remains unclear, and so far, Redmond's cloud and mobile strategies don't seem to be paying off.'"

Comments

Mayeb Not a Bad Thing?

[hduff]

Given how Microsoft has faltered in the marketplace, has failed to innovate and continues to misunderstand its customers, perhaps the old guys need to go.

Re:Mayeb Not a Bad Thing?

[h4rr4r]

Copying is not innovation. Releasing an AV to correct problems in your own OS is not innovation. They allow streaming? As opposed to what, denying it?

It is your computer slick.

Re:Mayeb Not a Bad Thing?

[Dr. Spork]

What's the most innovative product of 2010? The Kinect. It's not even a contest.

Re:Mayeb Not a Bad Thing?

[Dunbal]

Microsoft has been Ballmer's show for a while now.

This only goes to show that you can't fix some problems just by throwing more chairs at it.

Long Term Strategy to Take Down Apple

[HeraldMage]

Actually, the future of Redmond is secure. They're strategically letting all these folks go, so that they can all go work for, and eventually destroy, Apple from the inside out. It's like the Cylon infiltration of the human race on Caprica in BSG...

Or Google, or both.

Vote of no-confidence?

[kenrblan]

This could be a simple case that the departing employees simply have no faith in the direction Ballmer is leading Microsoft. When the ship is headed toward an iceberg and the captain is being stubborn or unaware, the best course of action is often evacuation.

Re:Vote of no-confidence?

[Sponge Bath]

Or it could be a case of the old guard being very wealthy and tired of the rat race. Past a certain point of wealth you should be concentrating on fulfilling some exotic desire and not being a product manager filling out paperwork.

Re:Vote of no-confidence?

[sunwukong]

When the ship is headed toward an iceberg and the captain is being stubborn or unaware, the best course of action is often evacuation.

Otherwise, it's just like throwing chairs on the Titanic?

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Simple explanation

[Locke2005]

If you are fully vested in your lucrative stock options and the share price can't go anyplace but down in the future, you'd be crazy not to cash out.

Ex-Microsoftie

[halo_2_rocks]

I worked for Bob for a few years and had alot of admiration for the guy. I left about 2 years ago during the mass layoff and it was the best career move I ever made. Microsoft has become (and was becoming when I left) a horrible place to work. Please, if you are considering a professional career in software development, DO NOT work there. Almost anywhere else is better. I currently work for a small software company as a CTO with about $100million in sales last year and the work environment difference is night and day. The reason Microsoft is faltering is because it has moved from a fun, innovative place to work to a serious personal and professional nightmare. You have to go through a political circus to justify you job there (your two reviews per year) where you have little input in the final determination about your job (the politics of Microsoft). I shudder to think about the years I wasted jumping through those hoops instead of working on product and helping customers. Again, avoid working at Microsoft at all costs.

Microsoft can't be all things to all people

[hilldog]

I still don't get why Microsoft feels they need to be a player in every category? Why Bling, smart phones, mp3 players, games, cloud computing, tablets and all the rest? Why not be a focused company with the leading office suite? Or an innovate O/S? Yeah yeah I know the investors must be kept at bay like howling wolves at the corporate door but how many missteps can a company make before they and we realize they are just followers and no longer leaders?

Re:Microsoft can't be all things to all people

[oracleguy01]

I think part of Microsoft's problem is that in the Office and OS markets in particular, their biggest competitor is themselves. They've made their products good enough where people don't bother upgrading when the new version comes out.

They could intentionally break backwards compatibility with former products to try and get people to upgrade but that doesn't really work for them. Case and point: they ended up releasing the backwards compatibility add-on so Office 2003 could read and write the 2007/2010 file formats.

I doubt they will really give up trying to break into new markets, they have their huge install base of core products to fall back on. It isn't like they are hurting for cash.

Re:Microsoft can't be all things to all people

[ejtttje]

It's an outgrowth of their core strategy of embrace, extend, extinguish. If there is a category using non-Microsoft products, it is a potential breeding ground for competitive technologies to take hold and spread into other markets where it could displace Microsoft. I interpret their faltering steps whenever they try to do something new as a result of being focused on simply blocking competitors as opposed to actually having any innovative insights of their own. (i.e. they decide to move into a market based on strategic value, not because they have any idea what they're going to contribute to that market.)

The person who needs to leave

[Required Snark]

is Balmer.

Re:The person who needs to leave

[davester666]

> The person who needs to leave ...
> is Balmer.

Why? Does Microsoft bring some inherent value to the software development field?

IMHO, they have done more to hamper the entire field than everybody else, primarily by using illegal methods to kill a number of really innovative operating systems back in the 80's and 90's.

And they still try to freeze new markets by spreading FUD while copying existing products instead of actually making something new.

Re:The person who needs to leave

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Everything old is new again. Some big companies get founded (or expanded way beyond their original size/scope) by famous entrepreneurs (Gates, the Watsons, Westinghouse, Ford(s), etc, etc.) and then are followed by nameless/faceless people who could never live up to the savvy or inspiration of the founders. Your post applies word-for-word to IBM in the late 70s; they'd lost all the big names and the big new innovations, the magic had just worn off, leaving only a whole lot of ugly underneath showing through. Microsoft will weather this. They'll go on to become just another large software company with uninspiring products, like any other - think Computer Associates. You don't criticize General Motors for not making Ferraris, why criticize Microsoft for not making OS X? Also, it's really kind of funny that Slashdot still uses the Bill Gates Borg icon for Microsoft, it hasn't been remotely true for years.

Apple (almost) went through this (voluntarily) once already with John Scully, it's about to happen again when Steve Jobs dies "suddenly". I expect a lot of "Apple loses their mojo" stories following that.

And before anyone says I'm some kind of Microsoft asrtoturfer, let me say that I'm a Gentoo-using Microsoft hater of long, long standing. I'm just saying that none of this should be surprising.

It is about choice Neo

[deadline]

Many people first used Windows not by choice, but by mandate -- there was no other option and the Microsoft monopoly made sure it stayed that way. (unless you bought a Mac) My guess is many people have found the MS experience frustrating and a general PITA, but there was never any other choice. They had to live with the shoddy time wasting experience Microsoft called computing.

Now given the option of having their "desktop experience" on their "phone" or "pad" I am sure many people are interested in real alternatives. My prediction is no matter how hard Microsoft tries to play the "we are the future of computing because we invented everything" song and dance, most users will chose iOS and Android for exactly that reason. Hi-tech karma at its best.

Kinect is not Microsoft innovation

[bussdriver]

1) it was developed and researched outside microsoft - they bought the tech and payed to have it mass produced; the concepts involved are even older.

2) The motion capture craze was created by Nintendo years ago and before that they attempted the idea with the failed power glove because the tech wasn't good enough back then to pull it off. (Although I saw a university VR lab put that glove to use as a 6degree motion controller)

3) Kinect is not that innovative, its an improvement to an existing idea of Nintendo's. Arguably, its not even an improvement because for many Wii games you only need the acceleration motions to play just fine and after the 1st hours of swinging around like an idiot I discovered I could do just as well sitting down using much smaller motions. I'm not just talking about the simple applications where the motion is really simple. Its more flexible to different styles of input. The kinect is a literal minded approach to somebody who doesn't quite "get it" which is typical Microsoft thinking. Take the motion thing and throw money at it and buy everything that lets you technically do the thing as well or better at an initially HUGE expense. They miss the concept of your natural inclination to move the controller about while STILL holding a controller and go 150% for capturing my body's motion. Its great for dance and stuff but its targeting an even SMALLER niche than nintendo's technically limited approach. If Nintendo did kinect, it would be done better because they are the true creative thinkers.