Microsoft's Ballmer asks investors for patience

[OhioChick]

At Microsoft's annual analyst meeting, CEO emphasized the importance of attracting new talent and reminded investors that IT successes don't happen overnight
July 26, 2007

Microsoft's CEO emphasized the importance of attracting talent and urged shareholders to be patient with the amount of time it might take the company to pursue its various business models, speaking during Microsoft's annual financial analyst meeting on Thursday.

"Vista doesn't get done by three people in a garage in three days," said Steve Ballmer. The company is making big bets, and some of them will take time to develop. "A great misconception in the tech industry is that most successes happen overnight," he said.

The two main areas that Microsoft aims to expand into are advertising and devices. While Microsoft once was largely defined as a desktop company, it has proved that it can expand into new sectors, Ballmer said. Around 18 years ago, Microsoft decided to get into the enterprise market and now is a major enterprise software company, he said.

"We are hell bent and determined to allocate the talent, resources, money, and innovation to become a powerhouse in the advertising business," he said. Microsoft is currently in third place in online advertising, behind Google and Yahoo, but he pointed to some Microsoft successes, such as deals to provide ads for Facebook and Digg as evidence of potential to improve that position.

On the devices side, products such as Windows Mobile, set-top boxes, Zune, and the Xbox, will be key to Microsoft's growth in the devices market, he said. "We need to have this business outlet for our software creativity to continue to grow and innovate and be relevant," he said. Microsoft will continue to use a variety of models in which it will provide a mix of software, hardware, and services, while sometimes relying on partners for some of those components.

Ballmer emphasized how important it is for Microsoft to continue to attract leading talent in order to drive these initiatives forward. In its fiscal year 2007, Microsoft hired almost 13,000 people, including 4,000 in product development areas, he said. Those hires continue to work in offices around the world, and they come from many different countries. As an example of the type of people working at just the Redmond, Wash., headquarters, 1,000 employees there speak Russian, he said.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/07/26/Ballmer-asks-Microsoft-investors-to-be-patient_1.html

[billyoc]

1. Sweaty Ballmer.

Please be patient, we'll get it working Real Soon Now. :eyes:

Use Linux

[OhioChick]

2. I Can't Stand That Man....

Sweaty sums him up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc

[wtmusic]

3. Be patient -- it might take awhile for MS to go belly up

but it's worth waiting for

[comtec]

4. Physical impossability

MS has tendrils in E V E R Y T H I N G ! ! !
if you were to stop windows marketing, etc, TOMORROW, MS would still be a multi billion a year company.
Besides, I don't want MS to go belly up, I want them to make a decent product.
Windows is acceptable, I prefer 2k, others prefer XP.. NO ONE really likes Vista.
I also run Ubuntu at home on a project box, and IM about to set up a dual boot on my new computer.
For the majority of people MS is good enough, and the bundled computers are cheap enough.
That's something Apple has never accepted, they cost too much for the average person.

[wtmusic]

5. Good points

I have been a programmer on both platforms (Mac/Windows) since the 80s and looking from the inside out MacOS is superior in many ways.

In the 90s people would laugh when I said one day Macs would dominate the PC market. Though Apple certainly doesn't dominate now, those people don't laugh anymore. Maybe some realize that the amount of downtime you spend trying to get a PC working the way it's advertised to is worth money as well -- and in that respect Macs are a bargain.

As Apple scales up Mac production, efficiencies of scale are going to allow introduction of a "Model T" budget Mac that everyone can afford.

[DWilliamsamh]

6. W/ All due respect people have been saying the same thing for 20 years

And Apple has NEVER had more than a tiny market share. Why? Because they cost too much due to the closed nature of their hardware.

The vaunted stability of the MAC is due entirely to the fact that Apple doesn't ALLOW "just anyone" to make hardware compatible w/ the MAC. That keeps prices artificially high. Until they open up to other hardware/software developers they will remain a tiny player in PC's. And when they DO open up (to bring costs down) they will lose the one advantage they have: Stability and the immunity from viruses that is due solely to the fact that its not worth anyone's time to write viruses and spy-ware for a platform that occupies less than 5% of the market.

[wtmusic]

7. The stability isn't vaunted; it's a fact

and the decision not to "open up" their hardware is a big reason for it. Doesn't it seem logical that maintaining control over their OS by including much of it into unhackable ROM would increase security?

Though I understand the low-cost attraction, apparently most people's time isn't worth as much as mine.

[DWilliamsamh]

8. OK... Don't be defensive.

I Meant Vaunted in the same way as the "Vaunted Chicago Bears Defense of '86." It wasn't a slam. and In fact I was saying that the Mac is very stable. I was just saying why it was stable.

And as far as cost.... don't be so arrogant and condescending....

If it was a matter of ROI (and TCO including support time) and WinTel boxes were found wanting so many years ago at the beginning of the revolution, MAC would have won th war in businesses, and therefore the war in homes. As it is the 20+% lower cost of comparably powered PC's is not offset by a higher crash rate (and the rate is lowered year upon year while the price gap doesn't ever seem to change). It's simple ROI and TCO.