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Steve Ballmer: We're a Devices and Services Company
Nerval's Lobster writes "According to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer's latest shareholder letter (not exactly a gripping read), Microsoft sees itself as a 'devices and services company.' The subsequent 1,200-odd words hammer that point, mentioning software such as Office and Windows 8 largely in the context of tablets and other hardware — and while Ballmer acknowledges the 'vast ecosystem of partners' building a 'broad spectrum of Windows PCs, tablets and phones,' he leaves the door wide open to Microsoft building its own toys in-house. If one takes Ballmer's words at face value, it seems that Surface, the tablet Microsoft's building in-house and promoting as a 'flagship' Windows 8 device, isn't so much a lark but the harbinger of the company's future direction. Whether Microsoft's decision to build its own devices affects its long-term relationship with Dell, Hewlett-Packard and other manufacturing titans remains to be seen. Perhaps Ballmer can take some comfort from Apple, which profited enormously by pursuing the 'we build everything in-house' route. But it's indisputable that a devices-centric approach is new ground for Microsoft."
Microsoft's mice and keyboards have always been really good - or a better way to put that would be - the old ones I bought years ago are really good. Still using them! I don't know about modern ones. My point? I like their peripherals so there is a chance the tech they make will be good. Software ... another matter.
Microsoft is a monopolistic public utility that sells Windows and Office the way Consolidated Edison sells electricity. Everybody buys it, but nobody particularly likes it.
IBM is not a technology company; it's a multilevel sales organization.
Apple is not a hardware company; it's a software company that bundles its software with large, sleek, phone-shaped license-enforcement dongles.
Google is not an Internet services company; it's an advertising and market research company. So is Facebook.
HP is a printer ink company that's desperately trying to be something else. Anything else.
Oracle is not actually a company; it's actually a newly discovered type of supermassive singularity with a gravitational pull that only affects corporate accounts.
Over the past 10 years we have watched some CEOs "of that level" run their tech companies straight into the toilette.
How is Sun Microsystems doing?
How is RIM doing?
How is Palm.. err USRobots.. no wait.. thats 3Com.. err.. PalmOne.. err.. Hows the hell is that Palm brand that Hewlett-Packard acquired doing these days?
By contrast, how are Intel, Cisco, Oracle, Apple, RedHat, Samsung, IBM, Google, VMWare/EMC, NetApp, Canonical, and about 100 other tech companies doing? Most are still stable-to-growing, even in this economic climate. Their brands are still very strong in the tech community, unlike the weakening Microsoft brand(s). They have growing mindshare, unlike Microsoft. They have greater *growth*, and they manage to do it without fudging numbers, channel-stuffing, or counting "downgrade licenses" as sales of their new goods.
Hell - Apple (a so-called premium brand!) and Google are almost printing their own money at this point, so don't go blaming the economy, either.
It's too easy to compare Ballmer with the short-sheeted dual-CEOs at RIM, the egomaniac (but vision-less) former CEO/lunatic of Sun, or the Eternal Microsoftie that's currently running Nokia.
Problem is, you illustrate my point for me, by comparing Ballmer to other, greater losers. Now compare him to the winners, and you'll notice that he comes up way the hell short...
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
XBox will NEVER even break even on total dollars. Running tab right now is in excess of 5 Billion (with a B) negative. They've had approximately 2 quarters in 7 years where they made money at about $100million overall that doesn't even touch the 5 billion in losses. As we're gearing up for the next hardware release the massive losses in the early days of the console are about to start again. MS is never going to make money on XBox and will likely continue to poor good money after bad until they can't afford it anymore.
I fully expect a apologist to argue that losing $5 billion to control a console market thats likely to fade away completely in the future is some badge of honor or future proofing. These people are idiots, that $5 Billion even if distributed directly to shareholders would have done more for MS than what they've spent it on. Balmer should have been fired years ago if for no other reason the XBox strategy of lighting big piles of money on fire.