Ballmer Says Amazon Isn't a "Real Business"

theodp writes According to Steve Ballmer, Amazon.com is not a real business. "They make no money," Ballmer said on the Charlie Rose Show. "In my world, you're not a real business until you make some money. I have a hard time with businesses that don't make money at some point." Ballmer's comments come as Amazon posted a $437 million loss for the third quarter, disappointing Wall Street. "If you are worth $150 billion," Ballmer added, "eventually somebody thinks you're going to make $15 billion pre-tax. They make about zero, and there's a big gap between zero and 15." Fired-up as ever, LA Clippers owner Ballmer's diss comes after fellow NBA owner Mark Cuban similarly slammed IBM, saying Big Blue is no longer a tech company (Robert X. Cringely seems to concur). "Today, they [IBM] specialize in financial engineering," Cuban told CNBC after IBM posted another disappointing quarter. "They're no longer a tech company, they are an amalgamation of different companies that they are trying to arb[itrage] on Wall Street, and I'm not a fan of that at all."

Comments

Bennett on e-commerce

[Anonymous Coward]

Ecommerce is a fast changing world and I know Balmer left Microsoft to go sow his oats in the basketball world, but I think we'd benefit from some insight from Bennett Haselton on the matter, someone outside many industries who has a proven track record for out of the box thinking. I'd like get some insight from him before I draw any conclusions. He's a frequent contributor.

Re:Wow

[Anne Thwacks]

You mean when Bill Gates was introduced to IBM by his mum with such a high recommendation that they bought an OS from him that he didn't even have?

Its hard to top that!

Re:Wow

[Ksevio]

Who gave you a monopoly on deciding which words people can use?!

I for one will mis Steve!

[frank_adrian314159]

I know that comes as a shock to many of you, but it's true - I will miss him. Motherfucker was comedy gold. Where else do you go for that these days? Schmidt? Fucking gray man in a fucking gray suit. Same with Tim Cook - you can put him in jeans, but he just is a guy hat would rather be in a boardroom than on a stage. Larry Ellison? Scary (appropriate for the season), but not funny. The new guy? Nadella? Has the whole exotic foreigner befuddlement thing down (and that's just with respect to HR practice vs. tech culture), but I figure he's not going to be the full-on Olympic chair-throwing, "developers, developers, developers", "I'm going to squirt you with my Zune", "fucking kill Google" sort of guy that Balmer was.

I'm just saying an age has passed. Nothing but gray men, as far as the eye can see. I love my new oligarchs.