
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months - tomorgan
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2013/aug13/08-23AnnouncementPR.aspx
======
lbarrow
He'll be remembered as a terrible CEO. Ballmer took over as CEO in 2000. In
the 13 years since then, Apple has experienced an unprecedented resurgence.
Google and Facebook have gone from being obscure startups to giants. The tech
industry went through the bubble, recovered, and today is stronger than ever.

What happened to Microsoft? While the rest of the tech sector exploded and
prospered, it stayed still. A MSFT share was worth about $35 dollars when
Ballmer took over; it's worth about $35 now. The world moved on, and Microsoft
didn't move with it.

~~~
fauigerzigerk
I agree that he will probably not be remembered for having more than doubled
revenue and almost tripled profits. He will not be remembered for transforming
Microsoft into one of the most important enterprise software companies. Not
for introducing .NET, C# or Kinect either. All of that will be forgotten.

He will be remembered for missing mobile. He will also be remembered for
caring a lot about developers and about developers and about developers as
well. The VB6 folks will still hate him ;-)

~~~
nl
It's hard to disagree with sarcasm on the internet. But in this case you are
absolutely correct.

Microsoft _used_ to control the future of computing. Now they are yet another
enterprise software company with no apparent mission except to make money.

The lay somewhere on a continuum with IBM, Oracle, SAP all the way through to
companies like CA. At one end of that spectrum they do research and produce
software that people use to do their job 0.5% better than they used to. At the
other end they may as well be accounting companies for all the impact they
have on the future.

Yes, they make money. And yes, I admit they try to compete with consumer
oriented technology companies and have some interesting products. But you are
100% correct - Microsoft is now primarily an enterprise software company.

Meanwhile Apple/Google/Amazon/Facebook/etc look toward the future.

~~~
sheri
There is a tendency to believe that the companies which are doing well right
now have 'won' in some sense. We need to understand that this is the state of
affairs right now. There is a non-trivial possibility that Facebook/Google etc
become lumbering giants just like MSFT.

~~~
EthanHeilman
>There is a non-trivial possibility that Facebook/Google etc become lumbering
giants just like MSFT.

It might already be true, how do you distinguish between a lumbering giant and
not without the help of hindsight? The public consensus on such things lags a
few years behind reality.

What signs have you seen in 2013 that Google is not a lumbering giant?

~~~
SiVal
Microsoft's approach was different: let others innovate, then we'll dominate.
Others would come up with new stuff, and Microsoft would "embrace and extend"
whatever got traction in the market by adding it to their near-monopoly OS/app
stack at whatever price served the purpose of eliminating the inventor and
taking their market.

This strategy always made Gates paranoid, because the risk was that some
alternative to the MS stack would take off too quickly to be killed. Without
their near monopoly power as a weapon, they would have no special competitive
advantage.

What they feared happened in the mid-90's when the Web took off and the
browser/Java combo threatened to be a universal VM on top of every PC. Gates
fought back with every weapon he had to fragment the universality of the meta-
platform. He was able to greatly slow, but not stop, the emergence of an OS-
independent Web, because he controlled the majority of the OS market
underneath it.

But then the second shoe dropped. Mobile came along and MS was not able to
stop its explosive growth. The growth of mobile made MS just another minority
OS underneath the Web, and they lost their ability to disrupt the
standardization of the Web platform. They were in the position they had always
feared: having to support the standards of others or be abandoned by their
customers as the Web became the new monopoly platform.

If Ballmer could have created the mPhone and mPad and given away for free an
mOS for phones that was a mini, modified version of .Net, maybe they could
have kept the Web fragmented and continued their platform dominance, but
whether that was even possible (MS did things second, not first, was only a
minor hardware developer, and seldom gave things away except when tied to
something they sold), I'll never know. Gates got to wield monopoly power;
Ballmer didn't.

MS's monopoly-based business model has to be abandoned, but do they have any
other? They'll come up with something, as IBM did, but I don't think they'll
ever be leaders again, because they didn't really "lead" before, except in
market share.

Google's business model (expand the Web platform for free, dominate Web
advertising, and employ an army of PhDs looking for something besides
advertising to do) is nothing like Microsoft's. If they ever lost advertising,
they'd go down harder than MS, and they could lose it if they ever lost much
search mindshare.

And Facebook? They're a website. They are completely dependent on the
psychological inertia of their users, which I wouldn't bet on long term.

~~~
laureny
> Microsoft's approach was different: let others innovate, then we'll
> dominate.

XBox, Surface and ergonomic keyboards would beg to differ. Not mentioning the
countless other innovations that didn't become as popular as these ones.

I know the Hacker News hive mind likes to perpetuate the myth that Microsoft
doesn't innovate but it innovates at least as much as, if not more than,
Google and Apple.

~~~
SiVal
I'm speechless. Well, almost. Apple revolutionized the music industry, how
music is sold, and how it's listened to. It revolutionized phones. Its iPad
changed consumer computing, media consumption, user interface expectations....
Five year olds are totally at home on an iPad and think a screen without touch
"isn't working". As they get older, all screens will have to conform to the
new reality. They revolutionized shopping for music, movies, and apps. They
revolutionized brick and mortar retailing with the most profitable stores of
all time.

And Google has changed human access to information so profoundly that I can't
adequately explain to my kids what it was like growing up in a world so cut
off from things other people knew. Google Earth is something from science
fiction. Street View lets me get to know my way around a town before I travel
there. I can take my kids for a walk past my old homes in four different
countries. Astonishing. And Google's self-driving cars may make driving off-
limits to humans in another few years.

Then there's Microsoft, with thousands of smart people working for decades
with billions of dollars of resources to work with---the most powerful of them
all until what feels like "recently" to me. And the evidence of their
innovative power: we have one of several game platforms, a billion-dollar
write-off tablet that they can't give away, and a kind of keyboard that
accounts for less than 1% of keyboards in use today. Oh, and other stuff that
"didn't become as popular as these".

I'm not saying they never came up with anything new. I'm saying that relative
to their size and resources, their innovations were trivial. Their huge impact
on business, on consumer use of the Internet, on the tech industry, on
governments, and so on, came not from revolutionary innovation but primarily
from their relentless efforts to monopolize markets.

Of course, the lifeblood of a company is profit, not innovation. Without
subsidies from ad revenues, Google's innovations could dry up quickly, and
cheap knock-offs could eventually take away most of the markets Apple has
revolutionized. But even if their profits prove short-lived, their amazing
contributions to society will live on. I doubt many in the future will feel
the same about Microsoft's contributions.

~~~
Silhouette
_Then there 's Microsoft, with thousands of smart people working for decades
with billions of dollars of resources to work with---the most powerful of them
all until what feels like "recently" to me. And the evidence of their
innovative power: we have one of several game platforms, a billion-dollar
write-off tablet that they can't give away, and a kind of keyboard that
accounts for less than 1% of keyboards in use today. Oh, and other stuff that
"didn't become as popular as these"._

This is not really fair, and I'm sure you realise that. As a random selection,
and in roughly decreasing order of significance from "world defining" to
"things you'd really miss if they weren't there":

We have a standardised desktop operating system that is familiar to nearly
every computer user on the planet, with which an array of hardware more
diverse than at any point in human history mostly just works, and on which
software probably written before some people reading this were born still
runs.

We have a history of programming languages that have advanced both the state
of industrial practice and the state of the art in research, and both
traditions continue to this day.

Until very recently, the majority of web pages were presented in one of a
handful of carefully designed, screen-optimised fonts that brought digital
typography far beyond its previous standard, which are available on almost all
major platforms, not just Microsoft's.

We have a wealth of ideas regarding HCI, from more efficient user interface
designs to accessibility techniques to support users with disabilities.

It's not difficult to think of more examples, and of course Microsoft have
also participated in numerous collaborative endeavours over the years that
have advanced the industry in other ways. No doubt an organisation with
Microsoft's resources could have achieved much more in recent years with more
visionary leadership, but the idea that their work has produced nothing more
than a few hardware devices over the years is just silly.

~~~
jamieb
>We have a standardised desktop operating system that is familiar to nearly
every computer user on the planet,

And then there's Windows 8.

Also, while we're on the subject, my 8 year old can put together an amazing
Keynote presentation on an iPad. She has never used a Windows OS.

~~~
dragonbonheur
8 year olds used to put together and modify games in BASIC. Microsoft BASIC.
How low we've fallen...

~~~
mthoms
Are you saying there's less 8 year old programmers now than there used to be?
That's just silly.

~~~
dchichkov
Yep. All the good once are stuck playing *craft games.

Find a modern 8-year old, who understand PC circuitry (at analog and digital
level), seen manufacturing processes, can re-solder components, can write
C/assembly, can develop basic useful applications (like, say MS Paint). I bet
you could easily find one like that, back in 70s-90s, particularly here in the
silicon valley. Now - I'm not so sure.

~~~
mthoms
I'm going to call you on that. First for moving the goal posts and second for
generalizing without any backup whatsoever.

From "Basic -> C/assembly"? Wow. That escalated quickly.

~~~
bkumar86
Is'nt it the logical transition, at least in some schools it was, and i was
thought the same way, begin with BASIC, and then as our curiosity increased we
moved onto c and 8051 hardware/assembly.

------
kjhughes
What were the key Ballmer era highlights?

== Negatives ==

* Clashes with Gates during CEO transition of power: [http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121261241035146237.html](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121261241035146237.html)

* Developer relations / motivational speaking (thanks mathattack): [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc)

* Employee retention (thanks JonnieCache, Ziomislaw): [http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/microsoft-ceo-im-going...](http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/microsoft-ceo-im-going-to-fing-kill-google/2005/09/03/1125302772214.html)

* Windows Phone: [http://www.forbes.com/sites/markrogowsky/2013/07/18/if-you-h...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/markrogowsky/2013/07/18/if-you-havent-seen-a-windows-phone-lately-its-because-theyre-practically-disappearing/)

* IPTV platform Microsoft Mediaroom (thanks nixy): [http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/02/03/bt_vision_upgrade/](http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/02/03/bt_vision_upgrade/)

* Vista (thanks balakk, danieldk)

* Internet Explorer neglect and market share declines.

== Mixed ==

* Failed Yahoo acquisition (thanks michaelpinto, seanmcdirmid, throwaway1979): [http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2008/may08/05-03le...](http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2008/may08/05-03letter.aspx)

== Positives ==

* Xbox / games division (thanks benihana)

* Enterprise successes (thanks gregd, facorreia)

* Facebook investment (thanks riffraff)

[edits: updates per reply comment suggestions]

~~~
rdl
Positives: Only threw away 10-20b on pointless acquisitions (aQ, etc.).
Successfully avoided buying Nokia, or pulling an HP/Compaq Fiorina fiasco, and
didn't buy a big dying services organization to chase IBM. Also didn't do like
HP's board with the lawsuits and revolving door CEOs and such. Avoided major
criminal activity.

~~~
devx
How about paying $8 billion for Skype, a zero-profit company, and almost
paying $40 billion for Yahoo?

~~~
lotso
Skype is about to pull in 2 billion in revenue. Surely there's some profit
there.

------
mathattack
Huge news! Let's see what happens to the stock today. It edged up a little at
the end of the day, suggesting that perhaps news was getting out. It's up 8%
in premarket trading. [1]

One interesting thing to note from that chart is their Beta (a measure of link
to market volatility) is less than 1, which is very low for a high tech stock.
It basically means that the market views them as less volatile to market
conditions than an index fund. Or put another way, more like a utility than a
high tech firm.

What does this mean for Microsoft? I think an awful lot will depend on his
replacement. I don't think they can get Gates to do another round. Who has the
breadth of skills to manage it all? Seems like a complex enough beast that
finding an appropriate outsider would be difficult too.

Going to another source [2] I see:

“As a member of the succession planning committee, I’ll work closely with the
other members of the board to identify a great new CEO,” said Gates. “We’re
fortunate to have Steve in his role until the new CEO assumes these duties.”

This suggests that he could be gone much sooner if the search goes well. These
things don't happen overnight, but it could be by the end of the year or even
sooner.

[1]
[http://finance.yahoo.com/q;_ylt=AsQ2vnc2OVs8WNqk.WdDwM.iuYdG...](http://finance.yahoo.com/q;_ylt=AsQ2vnc2OVs8WNqk.WdDwM.iuYdG;_ylu=X3oDMTBwdm1qNzVjBHNlYwNVSCAzIERlc2t0b3AgU2VhcmNoIDI-;_ylg=X3oDMTBucmRhZWhqBGxhbmcDZW4tVVMEcHQDcG1oBHRlc3QD;_ylv=3?uhb=uhb2&fr=yfinanceheader_test2&type=2button&s=msft)

[2] [http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2013/08/23/microsoft-ceo-
stev...](http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2013/08/23/microsoft-ceo-steve-
ballmer-to-retire-in-12-months/)

~~~
kabdib
Thank God. (Speaking as an ex-Microsoftie).

Hopefully MS will lose the "we need to put Windows on everything, including
embedded systems" attitude. Windows is a horrible bloated mess barely capable
of successfully running on a tablet PC, much less smaller things. (And if
you've ever had to /build/ Windows . . . OMG. OMFG).

There are core bits of Windows that are great; the I/O system is incredibly
well done. Then then are core pieces of Windows which are incredibly shitty --
in fact, there are registry entries that /nobody knows what they do/. No one
has had the gumption to clean that stuff up. But until they do, folks like
Apple (who seem to have a good handle on their technology /and/ consumer
design) will continue to be fierce competitors.

If they pick the wrong CEO, this could go south pretty quickly. They're going
to need someone tough, who has a good horse sense about consumers and can't be
snowed by engineering management trying to cover up mistakes.

BillG isn't coming back, but they need someone like him.

~~~
1337biz
But what could be the future of MS look like a strategic perspective? I am
pondering a bit about that. They are somewhat squeezed in between closed
system and open source. How can they position themselves for a solid path for
the future in that middle-ground.

~~~
rdl
A non-crappy enterprise mobile option alone (basically Blackberry 2013) would
be a $100b business. Neither Android nor iOS is that out of the box, and the
bolt-on ecosystem of crap doesn't turn either into as good a system as RIM was
in its heyday.

Look what phone DIRNSA uses today: a Blackberry.

I'd sell non-core assets (Xbox, Bing, hotmail, consumer stuff in general,
etc.), and focus on the core OS/mobile/Azure/Office/MSDN systems.

~~~
pwthornton
I think you might be underselling the enterprise features of iOS, particularly
with all of the Exchange support built in, ability to manage profiles with OS
X server, the remote wipe, encryption, etc. It's what I use for work, and a
Blackberry 2013 wouldn't get me to switch.

I would grant that there are specialized markets that MS could serve well in
the enterprise market, but what do you think the typical enterprise deployment
needs out of the box that iOS can't provide right now?

~~~
rdl
iOS devices themselves offer most of the hardware security features Blackberry
(old) offers (I actually know zero about BB X; it seemed unlikely to live to
adulthood, so I've ignored it). I love iOS for that.

iOS is undeniably a better web browser experience than Blackberry. It also has
a viable app ecosystem, but that mostly doesn't matter for enterprise.

The only large OS X Server-managed deployment I've heard of is Apple
internally. In Silicon Valley, I'd probably go with iOS-only (I don't believe
in BYOD, and crossplatform means LCD and pain) with either a third-party MDM
or maybe try OS X server. No way I'd do that in a 100k seat enterprise with
high security requirements -- 30-50 person shops aren't really "enterprise".

I am excited about iOS 7, but not at all excited about Apple's lack of any
real focus on enterprise. The only reason Apple has stuff like Kerberos
support in OSX is that Apple uses it internally.

Apple focuses on consumer (primarily), with iCloud, etc. as the main
management tool. There is a little bit more for small businesses and some
smaller education deployments, but aside from Apple.com, there isn't much
attention given to the enterprise market.

(If I got to pick a job, I'd rather be HHIC of Apple Enterprise
Products/Enterprise Security rather than CEO of Microsoft, personally. Either
would be a turnaround.)

------
Delmania
I think Ballmer is an interesting case study in perception versus results.
He's commonly portrayed as a poor CEO that has led Microsoft in the direction
of irrelevance. And yet, to quote oft critic Gruber, "he knows how to make
money"
([http://daringfireball.net/linked/2013/04/19/msft-q3](http://daringfireball.net/linked/2013/04/19/msft-q3))

I'd love to sit down and talk to him, and see if his vision is a bit more long
range than your average industry analyst, similar Paul O'Neill's vision on
worker safety and Alcoa in 1987.

~~~
potatolicious
I think both are correct. Ballmer was gloriously good at extracting profits -
out of existing, successful product divisions. I believe Ballmer has a firm
grasp of the enterprise market, and Microsoft's revenue and profitability
numbers reflect this.

But new product development, particularly consumer product development, at
Microsoft has largely fallen flat in the Ballmer years. WinPhone, Win8, Kin?

So while Ballmer has certainly increased the profitability of Microsoft,
critics are IMO right to point out that they've been unsuccessful in
developing future products to ensure their long-term survival.

~~~
seldo
Reacting to new market conditions is definitely Ballmer's problem. Under
Gates, the explosive growth of the web took them totally by surprise, and he
managed to swing the whole company around, producing the market-crushing
behemoth that was Internet Explorer 6, and green-lit the XBox on the basis
that "convergence" (i.e. computers running your TV) was inevitable. Those two
alone are really tough, smart, forward-thinking decisions that Gates nailed.

Under Ballmer, Microsoft had the same pattern repeatedly: Zune, Kin, Windows
Phone, Surface, Windows 8 -- they took too long to see the need, took way too
long to make the product, and when they did it was either not good enough, too
late, or both.

~~~
simonh
Except that IE was just a clone of Netscape and XBox was an attempt to
duplicate PlayStation. Neither of these were original or ground breaking
products. In fact with IE 6 he so badly misjudged the market that he assumed
the game was over and didn't even bother continuing development. IE 7 didn't
come out until 4 years later! Gates founded Microsoft's online businesses,
which have been losing money ever since. You count XBox as a success, yet MS
is in the hole over XBox by over a Billion dollars and will probably never
make money on it, taking past losses and write-offs into account.

~~~
seldo
I can't really speak to XBox as it's not my field, but IE 6 was definitely not
a clone of Netscape. I hate it with every fiber of my being, but Internet
Explorer invented a bunch of stuff we take for granted every day -- the iframe
tag is the first one that comes to mind, and they were also the first browser
to adopt CSS, way back in IE3. People forget that for a hot second in 1995
Netscape started swinging its weight around as the dominant browser and
introduced a bunch of half-baked ideas (the layer tag, for example).

IE6 was a terrible browser, but it was _the best browser at the time_. The
anti-competitive behaviour helped, and then of course they sat on their
laurels for years, but the best browser won.

~~~
dragontamer
Don't forget AJAX, which first appeared on IE5. Microsoft more or less
revolutionized the Web with AJAX.

Everyone seems to forget the most important examples...

------
edw519

      +------------------------------------+
      |                                    |
      | Microsoft has encountered an error |
      | and Wall Street is not responding. |
      |                                    |
      | If you choose to retire the CEO    |
      | immediately, you will lose any     |
      | unsaved cash cows and reboot the   |
      | corporate strategy.                |
      |                                    |
      |     [ Retire ]      [ Cancel ]     |
      |                                    |
      +------------------------------------+

------
sz4kerto
Paul Thurrot's comment:

"On a personal note, I'll just add that Ballmer was one of the good guys.
Though he was relentlessly mocked for his over-the-top public appearances in
years past, Ballmer was also relentlessly pro-Microsoft and it's very clear
that the troubles of the past decade were at least in part not of his making:
Ballmer inherited a Microsoft that had been driven into an antitrust quagmire
by Mr. Gates, handicapping its ability to compete effectively or respond to
new trends quickly. While many called for his ouster for many years, I never
saw a single leader emerge at Microsoft who could fill his shoes or the needs
of this lofty position. Looking at the available options today, I still
don't."

~~~
mathattack
"While many called for his ouster for many years, I never saw a single leader
emerge at Microsoft who could fill his shoes or the needs of this lofty
position. Looking at the available options today, I still don't."

This in and of itself is a failure of leadership. If you can't groom a leader
to replace you in 15 years, that's a problem. Some could argue it's deliberate
(defending their job) others might argue that he just didn't have it in him to
make it a priority. The board should have insisted. I would argue that our
last 2 presidents, and the current mayor of NYC have made the same problem.

~~~
RougeFemme
Not disagreeing, just clarifying. . .do you mean that the last 2 presidents
and Bloomberg should have been/should be more involved in grooming folks
within their respective parties to take their places?

~~~
mathattack
Yes. Independent of your political stance, shouldn't Bush have groomed a few
successors? You can see Obama's failure to groom the next generation when the
top two candidates predate him by 20 years. NYC's mayor took a third term
because there was no obvious candidate, and there's still not a good one.

~~~
outside1234
I hadn't thought of that Bush failure! I'm adding it to the list as #523.

------
rdl
Since the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has a huge percentage of its
wealth still in MSFT stock, I think Bill Gates can make a case to himself that
picking the best possible leader for MSFT will save hundreds of thousands of
marginal children.

If I were him, there would be two candidates: Qi Lu (insider, obvious choice),
or, for the ultimate in turnaround ballerdom: Ben Horowitz (from a16z). Either
would be a vast improvement on Ballmer, but Qi Lu would be the "safe" choice,
mostly doubling down on trends within Microsoft. Ben Horowitz would put
Microsoft solidly at the core of Silicon Valley, plus it would signify that
Microsoft views the next 10 years as "wartime" with a CEO to match.

(The other low-odds pick would be Bill Gates Round 2, but that seems unlikely
just due to where he is in life. I could maybe see it as "Interim CEO". He'd
do an awesome job I'm sure.)

~~~
tanzam75
> _Since the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has a huge percentage of its
> wealth still in MSFT stock, I think Bill Gates can make a case to himself
> that picking the best possible leader for MSFT will save hundreds of
> thousands of marginal children._

According to its most recent SEC Form 13F, the Gates Foundation Trust does not
hold any Microsoft stock whatsoever. About 47% of its stock holdings are in
Berkshire Hathaway.

As for Bill Gates himself, he currently owns less than 5% of Microsoft. That's
still almost $14 billion, but it's just 11% of Bill Gates + Warren Buffett's
combined wealth. (Both of them are giving essentially their entire fortunes to
the Foundation.)

~~~
rdl
Wow, thanks for digging that up. I assumed BG had done transfers of stock, but
I guess he sold it on a plan and gave the cash to the foundation.

Another amazing thing about the BMGF is that it doesn't want to be permanent
-- spending all assets within 20 years of the deaths of Bill and Melinda, and
for the Buffet contribution, within 10 years of his death. (Based on age, it's
highly likely WB will predecease either Bill or Melinda Gates.)

------
rrrrtttt
Let me tell you an anecdote why I think Ballmer was incompetent and largely
responsible for the sorry state that Microsoft is in at the moment. Yesterday
there was a long article in the Israeli newspaper Globes about the success of
the Israeli adware companies. Israel has in recent years become a world leader
in software that installs unwanted toolbars on your elderly dad and mom's PC
and "monetizes" them until they get their son or daughter to come over and fix
it.

The list of such companies includes some really big ones, like Babylon and
Conduit. These companies are making their profits by degrading Windows users'
experience. Not only didn't Ballmer do anything to fight them, Microsoft
actually has affiliate agreements with these companies to take a slice of the
profits. Screwing your own customers like that cannot end well for Microsoft.

~~~
tuananh
Can you provide the source about the part " Microsoft actually has affiliate
agreements with these companies to take a slice of the profits"?

~~~
shrikant
I remember the Microsoft deal with Conduit [1], but can't dig up anything that
links Microsoft with Babylon.

Interestingly, that link implies that Conduit had a deal with Google before
they got a better deal for switching to Bing.

[1] [http://allthingsd.com/20101201/conduit-dumps-google-
search-f...](http://allthingsd.com/20101201/conduit-dumps-google-search-for-
microsofts-bing/)

~~~
woodchuck64
I think that's the point: when Google has refused to continue to profit off
browser-hijacking companies, Microsoft is only too eager to step up to offer
Bing.

------
sriramk
As someone who spent five years working at MSFT under Steve as CEO, my first
reaction is sadness. Steve spent over three decades working there, it is an
end of an exceptional career, regardless of how his run as CEO might have
been.

------
jusben1369
I'm most interested with the "type" of CEO they replace him with. Broad
categories:

\- Within Tech: They hire an Apple type key executive whose background is all
around getting hardware/software/direct sales to work together. They want to
move to be a super tight, integrated brand. \- Outside of Tech: They hire from
a GE type of company. This acknowledges that they're a sprawling behemoth and
will stay that way. They need someone who can manage a hugely disparate
conglomerate. \- Tech vs Sales: Broadly speaking Bill was a product guru with
a huge slice of business acumen. Ballmer was all sales and number driven. How
we describe the new hire will be interesting. \- Mobile vs Cloud. Do we end up
with someone really well known for their mobile background? Or someone who is
really well thought of for understanding the cloud? For example Apple has
generally nailed mobile and struggled in cloud. MSFT has actually done a
little better in cloud than they're given credit for. But it will tell us what
they think is more important by the hire.

Any other suggestions?

~~~
simonh
I want to live in a world where they hire Scott Forstall. It'll never happen,
he's not an idiot, but oh boy would that be a ride!

~~~
panacea
"It'll never happen"

It would mean he needs to get out of his leather couch, but why not?

------
tmister
People here will argue that he is the worst CEO ever, that's debatable of-
course. But I want to say some good things about him. To me he is a guy in a
suit who understood software development. He shouted (in)famous "developers,
developers, developers"[1], he knew that LOC is not a good measurement of
software development[2], he poured loads of money in MSR ignoring the pressure
of shareholders. For these reasons only he is a fine guy in my book. So I
thank him for his works in Microsoft.

[1]
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8To-6VIJZRE](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8To-6VIJZRE)

[2]
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWylb_5IOw0&feature=player_de...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWylb_5IOw0&feature=player_detailpage#t=2338)
(go to 38:59 time mark)

------
rdl
Wow, this is going to be the best thing for MSFT stock (and probably the
company) in the past 10 years. I'm excited about having a real force to
counterbalance Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon again.

This, and the other company response to it, might be good for +0.05% GDP
growth or something crazy like that.

~~~
ljoshua
Already up about $2.70 (8%) in pre-market trading. Looking to be very good.

~~~
CurtHagenlocher
What a fabulous present to all of us employees whose stock vests on 8/31!

------
pmelendez
Funny thing that people tend to prefer Gates' version of Microsoft ( which is
full of popular but sub-quality products) rather than Ballmer's version ( with
unpopular but more stable products)

~~~
hannibal5
I only realized what was wrong with Gate's version of Microsoft few years
before he retired. It was only then when I learned that Gate's has been the
chief software architect of MS all these years.

Gate's is very intelligent guy, brilliant and ruthless businessman and knows
software, but he is not software architect. When Ray Ozzie took over, things
turned instantly better. Chief software architect is the guy who have to
balance between the need to add features and general soundness of the system
that translates into quality in long term. Gates clearly did not have that
ability. MS products never had general feel of good design principles you get
from many other software products.

------
clarky07
I feel bad for ballmer. his legacy is going to be pretty terrible because the
stock price was flat from when he took over until now. nobody seems to take
into account that he took over in the middle of the tech bubble bursting and
msft was hugely overvalued at the time. I think profit has tripled since he
took over or something like that. following gates was already going to be one
of the hardest tasks possible. getting handed an overvalued company in the
middle of a bubble bursting makes it all but impossible.

while i don't actually think he was a good ceo, i think he is much better than
he gets credit for. they say he missed mobile, but i think windows phone is
pretty good and new take on it. it was just a year or 2 late. xbox has been
pretty fantastic overall. windows 7 was good. i think windows 8 has potential.
azure is pretty good as far as i can tell. sure vista sucked (though not as
badly as everyone says), and there have been other failures (kin anyone?).

People act like other good ceo's don't ever fail. Jobs had plenty of failures.
Ping, mobile me, etc... Jobs had the "benefit" of taking over an almost dead
company. making it thrive meant stock went crazy and he gets to be awesome.
Ballmer just got in on the wrong end of the market. Tim Cook might have this
problem as well, but at least Apple wasn't wildly overvalued at the time.

------
davidbrear
Steve Ballmer is the perfect example of why a business person should not run a
software company. The opinion that "Steve knows how to make money" is a poor
indicator of a successful leader. Microsoft has alienated developers leaving
only enterprise developers to create boring interfaces for users causing many
personal computer users to find something more aesthetically pleasing
(OSX/Ubuntu). A company based solely on making money is like a marriage based
solely around sex and benefit to social-status. If you're a .NET developer and
this offended you; good. Money != happiness

~~~
onebaddude
>The opinion that "Steve knows how to make money" is a poor indicator of a
successful leader

Tell that to the people who, you know, _own the company_.

I'm sure they'd be thrilled with your plan to make pretty interfaces but no
profits.

------
DonnyV
Scott Guthrie for CEO!!!!
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Guthrie](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Guthrie)

~~~
hrvbr
He's more of a CTO.

"CEO of Microsoft" is a prestigious title. They could use it as an opportunity
to pull a coup. Like offering to merge with Facebook and giving the title to
Zuckerberg. It doesn't have to be with FB, any big guy that would bring a
missing market to Microsoft's empire would be a coup.

But the reasonable thing to do is to hire from inside.

~~~
robert-wallis
I always believed leaders should do the main thing the company does.
Microsoft's new CEO should write software and make hardware. It's hard for me
to respect a manager that doesn't understand what I do.

------
jaxbot
It must really hurt the self-esteem of a CEO when they announce retirement and
the stock goes up.

That being said, it's about time. Microsoft has had too much misdirection
lately and really needs to either pull it together or drop out of some of its
markets.

~~~
img
Given that Ballmer has ~400 million shares of MSFT, I think the billion dollar
increase in paper net worth probably softens the blow.

------
bornhuetter
Good news, this really had to happen. One of Microsoft's biggest problems is
one of PR - too many people, particularly in the media have just hated
Microsoft for years, and Ballmer is not charismatic enough to ever recover
from that position. They need new blood, and to shake off the "old Microsoft"
image if they want to win hearts and minds again.

~~~
devx
Marketing and PR can only do so much to improve the image of a company or
product. That company or product actually has to have _great_ core values or
qualities.

Microsoft is forcing OEM's to pay licenses for using open sources operating
systems, they're throwing mud against competitors in the media and in social
media, and there's still this very real feeling that Microsoft hasn't shaken
off the "evil" attitude and culture inside the company.

New pretty colors on its OS and hiring better PR people aren't going to help
with that. The company need to change from the _inside-out_ , not outside-in.

~~~
bornhuetter
I really don't think Microsoft's main product offerings are that bad. The
biggest issue with Metro and Windows Phone is a lack of developer support -
and I think a significant part of that is caused by a lot of the best
developers being either Apple or Google "fanboys". Office remains excellent,
Windows 8 is excellent at what it intended for - office productivity, games,
VS development etc.

But the media hates them, OEMs mostly don't seem to care very much about
making good hardware for PCs, Windows tablets and windows phones. To me this
is at least partly a symptom of their image problem.

EDIT: I say this as an open source advocate - I would love it if Linux based
systems became more popular, but I recognize the quality of Microsoft's
products in terms of what they are intended for.

~~~
xradionut
Bullshit. Microsoft crapped on it's developers, IT and users when it released
Windows 8. How are you supposed to develop for a system when the frameworks
change every couple of years? Not to mention pissing off independents,
dropping TechNet and raising license costs across the board. Price out a
decent MS server solution and 60 to 80 percent of the cost is Microsoft
licenses. Azure isn't a solution either since Redmond is Yet Another NSA
Bitch.

~~~
danieldk
You are quite a drama queen :). Windows 8 applications can still be programmed
in .NET languages. Given that probably 80% of the application is not 'front-
end' code, it can be compiled without changes. On the front-end you can still
use whatever was used before, since the desktop still exists. And if you want
to go all-'Metro': there is a learning curve, but it is not that steep, since
Windows 8 applications are also developed using XAML et al.

Disclaimer: as a OS X and Linux user, I don't know much about Windows.

~~~
xradionut
Disclaimer: As a developer and admin primarily on Windows for the last 18
years, I know more than I want to know about Windows. BTDT, got the
t-shirts...

------
bedhead
$24 billion. That's the increase in market value as of 15 minutes before the
open. This has to be a record for a CEO announcing he's leaving. I've always
wondered how much these types of things bruise the egos of the retiring execs.

~~~
vidarh
The few hundred million that his own Microsoft shared have appreciated in
value ought to at least partially make up for his bruised ego...

------
sz4kerto
I don't think Ballmer was a crap CEO, but because many people think he is,
therefore just the fact he leaves is good for the company.

------
nicholassmith
'It'll be better without Ballmer' is the 'If Jobs were alive' of the Microsoft
world. I don't necessarily think that Microsoft has been doing a swell job,
but I didn't think they were when Gates was in charge. Mostly it's a
disappointment that they're _that_ big and doing _that_ little progressive.

Still, he's not been an awful CEO, business has been good under Ballmer but
progression has been awful.

------
wslh
Good news, bad news, who knows?

I don't know if current Microsoft issues are in their DNA or not. Personally I
was bullish (yes I put my money where my mouth is) of MSFT but I mainly found
the following obstacles to be more optimistic:

\- The relationship with developers was deteriorating: I am a MSDN customer
and tried to upgrade but they don't give me any discount in the first year of
upgrade while keeping with my same subscription level I have discounts. In our
company we also have issues with getting new keys (or using the existing ones)
for their software and we need to talk to someone personally to receive them.

\- Windows 8 / Office are in the middle of a transition but not there: I think
having a hybrid mobile/desktop OS is a good idea. But I don't like to use my
desktop in the way I use a mobile device (i.e: the famous start button) or the
reverse. If they want to go mobile they must implement an Office that can be
used with a new UI.

\- The Microsoft web offerings like Microsoft 365 are slow, difficult to
configure, buggy. If they just copy Google/Apple style they would benefit a
lot.

Disclaimer: I love Visual Studio and C#.

~~~
gregd
Microsoft's licensing schemes are riddles, wrapped in enigma's and covered
with shit. I'm actually surprised that Windows doesn't have In App Purchases.
You want to search? It's only 2.99! You want the desktop? It's only .99!

I've never encountered the issues you have with MSDN. I believe you only
because the team that dreams up their licensing/key schemes, should be forced
to use them.

The jury is still out on Windows 8. Having left my enterprise setting prior to
Windows 8 become widely available (hell I left even before we moved to Windows
7), I wonder how Win8 is to manage in an enterprise setting. Most users that
I've encountered, would have had a hell of a time transitioning from the
traditional Windows XP/7 desktop, to Metro. My office would have been queued
with "Where is the Start menu?"

~~~
RyJones
Licensing being complex is a feature. It gives Microsoft something easy to
wheel and deal on; it also gives OEM salespeople something to hide profit in
("gosh, sorry your enterprise desktops came out $40/seat high, but Microsoft
gets all of that" while $35 of that is pure profit for the OEM)

~~~
wslh
MSDN is a different beast. They give you a lot of licenses for development. In
our company we have hundreds of VMs that are created and thrashed all the time
so having issues with licenses is a problem for QA.

------
terhechte
Now the question is, whoever will be next at the helm, will he / she be able
to reverse directions and steer Microsoft into more relevant and fruitful
territories.

Ballmer's Microsoft was always late to the party, overseeing important
technology trends and society transformations out of, I'd call it a mix of
ignorance and arrogance; maybe they were also too blended by their previous
successes. The way he dismissed iPhones, iPads, the way they developed their
OS. Or the Zune, or Bing, there has been much criticism over the years. I
don't know which moves would have been better (except for seeing the mobile
future and the suckyness that was Windows Mobile 6 in time), but Ballmer was
always more of a numbers guy I hear, and less of a visionary. I hope their
next big guy is going to have more vision.

This may be a good day to buy their stock, if you like 50/50 games.

~~~
c2prods
I'm skeptical about Microsoft recovering. They clearly missed the mobile
revolution. But let's hope they'll be able to tackle directly the next
challenges (wearable computing, etc.)

~~~
rom16384
They also clearly missed the internet revolution, but managed to recover. Big
companies have trouble adapting to new paradigms, but it's not impossible for
them to do it, especially when they have so many resources at their disposal.

~~~
twoodfin
I don't think Microsoft's response to the web is comparable to their failures
in mobile. billg's "Internet Tidal Wave" memo went out in 1995, long before
the web had become ubiquitous. They still had plenty of time to (legally or
otherwise!) ride the .com tidal wave to dominant marketshare and huge
profitability.

A similar memo would have done the most good in 2005, when it was becoming
clear that we'd soon all have access to pretty decent wireless networks and
high performance pocket computers, but also clear that WinCE and the PocketPC
were lousy ways to take advantage of those facts.

~~~
c2prods
I don't think missing the Internet revolution was their biggest mistake. If
you look at Apple they focused on hardware. What Microsoft could have done
too. Instead, they just tried to continue this Windows monopoly and overlooked
everything else.

~~~
twoodfin
My point was they _didn 't_ miss the Internet revolution. In fact, they picked
up on it faster than most of the '80's tech companies and radically shifted
strategy because billg knew that by, say, 1997, it might have been too late.

I agree that trying to remake the PC space in the PDA and phone worlds was a
strategic blunder for Microsoft. OEMs competing to build low-margin devices
for a common OS worked for Google because they could afford to give Android
away for free and the carriers and handset makers were terrified of Apple.

On hardware, Microsoft had a model to follow: XBox. Imagine if they'd built an
"XPhone" in 2005 instead of playing me-too to Apple with the Zune.

------
devx
Long, long overdue. He should've been fired ( _ahem_ \- retired) after the
Vista failure, which was _his_ failure. It took Sinofsky to turn things around
with Windows 7, and deliver on time.

Hopefully this means a lot less "Metro" in Windows 9.

------
joshuaellinger
They could buy Yahoo! and put Marissa in charge...

------
outside1234
The question really is: who is the best to run Microsoft?

Its a hard choice: too much enterprise for anyone at Google, have to talk to
folks outside of Microsoft (partners, enterprise) so that rules out anyone at
Apple. So who then?

------
colmvp
> Steve Ballmer joined Microsoft on June 11, 1980, and became Microsoft's 30th
> employee, the first business manager hired by Gates.

> Ballmer was initially offered a salary of $50,000 as well as a percentage of
> ownership of the company. When Microsoft was incorporated in 1981, Ballmer
> owned 8 percent of the company. In 2003, Ballmer sold 8.3% of his
> shareholdings, leaving him with a 4% stake in the company

Wow. How common is it for such a late employee to have so much percentage of a
company?

~~~
scholia
It was a very small company and self-financing, so its stock hadn't already
been gobbled up by venture capitalists.

------
pdknsk
Stock immediately went up 7% on the news.

[http://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AMSFT](http://www.google.com/finance?q=NASDAQ%3AMSFT)

~~~
yogo
It could be the dawn of a new era for Microsoft. The company's stock didn't do
anything exciting in the last decade but to Ballmer's credit he did keep the
ship afloat.

------
rckrd
It will be interesting to see if Microsoft follows a Yahoo like trajectory -
and if Apple follows Microsoft's trajectory after a few years of Tim Cook.

~~~
baggachipz
I would bet on it. This seems to be the cycle of tech companies: Innovate when
small, rake in profits for years, lag behind, and slowly die. What has Apple
produced under Cook? A couple small improvements to current products, and
nothing new or noteworthy. There may be a couple innovations still in their
incubator from days past, but in 5-10 years people will be saying the same
things about Apple.

------
Dogamondo
I guess he finally opened the '3rd envelope'

~~~
knz42
I opened the thread just to post this comment. :)

Glad you did!

------
dave1619
Anyone else thinking Bill Gates might be "chosen" to be the next CEO of
Microsoft?

It might sound ridiculous but he's been involved with his foundation work now
for several years so it should be running well. He could probably leave the
foundation to others to run now. So, he could return to Microsoft to try to
lead it's resurgence. It's a challenge I wonder if he's up for.

------
mckoss
Ironically, the roughly 7% increase in MSFT share price due to his retirement
announcement, has added nearly $1B to Balmer's net worth.

------
tomorgan
This story is Developing, Developing, Developing...

~~~
pdwetz
Or, perhaps: Retirement! Retirement! Retirement!

(to the cheers of investors)

------
rshlo
I think the main problem with it's leadership is that Microsoft lost it's
innovative spirit. I think the main reason for that is that Ballmer is a
business and marketing guy, and not a tech guy. All the giants today are led
by tech people and that's effect the entire culture of all the company.

~~~
hollerith
Tim Cook has an MBA and a BS (earned in 1982) in industrial engineering. I was
in college in the years leading up to 1982 and I socialized with industrial
engineers. It is likely that Cook took only one course that involved
programming (excluding programmable calculators). And the descriptions of his
jobs ("chief operating officer (COO) of the computer reseller division of
Intelligent Electronics", "12 years in IBM's personal computer business as the
director of North American Fulfillment") suggest strongly that he did not do
any programming once he left school.

------
jetpackparakeet
Scott Forstall is available last I heard.

~~~
sgt
People may scoff at this - but why not? His experience from Apple and NeXT
should transcend into an organization like Microsoft. He will be an extremely
useful asset, although perhaps a bit dictatorial from what I've heard.

~~~
jemeshsu
and bring skeuomorphic user interface to Windows 9? That will totally
brainfuck the whole UX industry.

~~~
fieryeagle
That'd be the day that I introduce my fist to the monitor.

------
benmorris
Finally, it was time for Ballmer to go.

~~~
k2enemy
Exactly. My reaction, and I imagine everyone's reaction, upon reading the
headline was, "finally."

------
leokun
Microsoft isn't going in the opposite direction that it should be going on.
Instead of integrating more, it needs to make more software for Android and
iOS. If it weren't tying everything into Windows all the time Office and other
Microsoft software would be dominating App Store and Google Play, ensuring its
success for the next generation.

Instead it's tying everything back into Windows and Windows phone. Those
things should stand on their own feet. Microsoft can create great versions of
its software for all platforms, but instead it handicaps itself to no great
effect. Limiting Office to just its own platform hasn't really made much of an
impact.

------
khawkins
Some people are claiming Balmer deserves some credit for keeping Microsoft
profitable/status quo, but it seems like they're forgetting the stranglehold
Gates had on computing when he left. It's not hard to keep the gravy train
flowing. This is part of Balmer's problem, is that Microsoft thought it could
stay current by essentially continuing its model of releasing new, sleeker
versions of the same software every few years, ignoring that the fundamental
way in which we interact with computers has changed drastically over the part
decade. By the time they do innovate, they're too far behind to matter.

------
Killah911
Congrats to Microsoftians! Hope the future holds better leaders and brighter
days...

------
BudVVeezer
In honor of this news: developers, developers, developers, developers...in
techno.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6ZarKIKpSA](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6ZarKIKpSA)

~~~
ape4
Of course, he was right any platform needs developers.

------
mgirdley
Ironically, their CEO search process reflects the bureaucratic nightmare that
is today's MSFT. Why not just park Gates in an office and interview the 10
best MSFT senior execs?

------
agentsaran
Terrible CEO or not. Under his leadership Microsoft stopped becoming a
software leader. They stopped leading and started following. Yes. Great
products were launched. Windows Phone 8 (really cool interface), the Surface
tablet, the xBox, Azure, various improvements to Bing. But they were outdone
by competitors in almost all of these areas. Microsoft has to keep innovating,
they have to become the disruptors. Right now, they're just busy playing
catchup.

------
danabramov
[https://twitter.com/spolsky/status/370917100593762304](https://twitter.com/spolsky/status/370917100593762304)

------
smackfu
If you think about it, what does the "within 12 months" part even mean? Like,
if the deadline hits, they'll just take whoever they can get?

~~~
chollida1
> If you think about it, what does the "within 12 months" part even mean?

I'm not sure what part about that is confusing. In case you are ESL it means
that Ballmer will retire before one year has elapsed.

> Like, if the deadline hits, they'll just take whoever they can get?

Running one of the largest, profitable and most prestigious companies in the
world is a pretty good job. I'm pretty certain that there will be no shortage
of qualified people willing to become the CEO:)

No one makes an announcement like this without planning ahead, they've already
got either a new CEO or a very short list of people who they've already
vetted.

~~~
smackfu
I mean, a much more common way to do this is something like "has informed the
company of his intention to retire as soon as a successor is announced." Or
"announced he will retire at the end of the year and that the company’s board
of directors has approved the promotion of X to CEO."

Throwing a deadline in there is just odd.

~~~
RougeFemme
It may be more common, but I think that if it's stated the first way, it seems
less planned and deliberate and it's more likely to rattle the market - or at
the very least, send the media off looking for nefarious, non-business-related
reasons for the retirement. It's almost as bad as suddenly retiring to "spend
more time with the family".

------
kunai
Ballmer's Microsoft really did have some intensely great research and
development going under the hood, but the management was completely
unacceptable for such a large company. There needed to be individual units so
each team could work at their best, but unfortunately, the piss-poor
management that Ballmer headed didn't allow this, and resulted in the up-down
nature of Microsoft's product releases.

------
bosch
Help!

On the off chance anyone at Microsoft reads this, my Microsoft account got
deleted by a bug in Live Domains and I haven't been able to successfully
contact anyone to report it or fix it. The forums have been useless and now I
can't do anything MS related without my account including my phone!

My e-mail is in my profile.

(Apologies for posting this as I know it doesn't add to the discussion but I
have no idea how else to contact an MS engineer.)

------
jeffpersonified
We've hit the Ballmer peak!

------
mayhaffs
Microsoft successfully won the battle of the desktop computer. It's amazing
how this monument of achievement actually gave Microsoft a long-term
disadvantage as desktop computing slowly became irrelevant to laptops and
mobile. Failing now promotes success in the future. It will be interesting to
see what happens over the next 10 years, especially with DIY and web dev on
the rise.

------
anuragramdasan
My biggest hope from all of this would be for Microsoft to enhance its current
products. They have been trying to get into too many fields while at the same
time forgetting to make their main priority products perfect.

Considering the rising impact Linux has been having over the past few years,
I'd only be glad to see Microsoft try to come up with a superior operating
system.

~~~
baggachipz
> They have been trying to get into too many fields while at the same time
> forgetting to make their main priority products perfect.

And when, pray tell, did they do that?

------
fsckin
Time to write three letters.

------
wil421
About time. I hope that he picks someone that can take MSFT from the boring
and problematic company that we have no choice but to deal with, to a company
that is producing products that actually make it easier to use things and more
powerful (Windows 8 was a huge step back).

They need someone who will innovate and continue to innovate.

------
ajays
I know the stock price isn't everything, but this is quite telling about
Ballmer's reign:
[http://tinyurl.com/ballmerballmer](http://tinyurl.com/ballmerballmer)

I didn't include AAPL, because that would have destroyed the others. And GOOG
wasn't around in 2000.

------
digerata
If anyone sees this as anything other than him FINALLY getting canned, then I
have a bridge to sell you.

------
dmourati
Microsoft _stifled_ innovation. For a twenty year period, they held market
dominance and used their monopoly power to maintain the status quo. They did a
huge disservice to our entire industry. I say good riddance to bad rubbish.

------
awsm
Not that it will happen, but I would like to see what Marissa Mayer could do
with MSFT.

~~~
bryang
THAT would be in interesting...

------
nvk
tl,dr; Board of Directors, "Buddy time to go, it's not working out."

~~~
michaelwww
"Steve, we feel you should spend more time with your family"

------
npguy
Just after piracy hit all time lows. Good timing really.

[http://fakevalley.com/microsoft-pirated-software-sales-
also-...](http://fakevalley.com/microsoft-pirated-software-sales-also-at-all-
time-low/)

------
daigoba66
i wonder if his last day will be as awesome as this:
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1M-IafCor4](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1M-IafCor4)

------
smallegan
As of right now the stock is up 6.5% upon the announcement of Balmers
departure, that certainly can't feel good. (Other tech stocks appear to be
down or holding level today)

------
jokoon
I wonder what is bill gates thinking or planning now. Or what happened between
him and ballmer from his nomination.

Just looked after the reasons Bill Gates Stepped down, could not find a lot

------
known
He is suffering from
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Principle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Principle)

------
pelemele
They got awesome ideas but a really awful implementation of them - Tablet PC
and Pocket PC devices/mobile phone (MDA anybody?) are two examples...

------
tiatia
Well, Mr. Apotheker, formerly SAP, formerly HP is available.

He could give away the XBox, windows and office for free and migrate Microsoft
more to enterprise software.

------
meerita
$500 for a phone????

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U)

------
harel
Maybe Bill will make a Steve Jobs style comeback?

~~~
xutopia
That's highly unlikely. Bill Gates is busy with his foundation.

~~~
harel
It was very much a tongue in cheek comment but either way not only its
unlikely, Bill can actually do good things with his foundation. Taking
Microsoft out of the pit its in would be very difficult

------
hkarthik
I hope they find the right leader to take over, and avoid a fate similar to
what happened to HP over the past decade.

------
tomorgan
Is it too soon to start discussing who is going to replace him? Any thoughts?
I'm guessing not Sinofsky...

~~~
gregd
Bezos

------
xzrrwe
So, are they getting rid of that company destroying stack ranking at last?

Or did Ballmer got into the 10% stack at last!?

------
pcunite
And there was dancing in the streets!

------
davidcollantes
About time. He should have retired earlier.

I would not wait twelve months; just pretend he died, and move on.

------
anuragramdasan
From Vista to Surface RT, was it? I am just glad. A much needed change for
Microsoft.

~~~
rdl
The recent "strategy memo" really should have been the last straw, where
"creating shareholder value" was their mission.

~~~
anuragramdasan
Indeed. His reign over the past 10 years not only resulted in not much
progress for microsoft but also hampered its reputation. Would be really
interesting to see how the new management takes over and brings about some
real changes.

------
bencollier49
Microsoft shares up in value in 5,4, oh it's already happened.

------
telephonetemp
I wonder: is this bad news or good news for Windows Phone?

~~~
sevkih
windows what?

------
joeldidit
Maybe now they'll stop harassing me.

------
ianstallings
Meanwhile, down at NASDAQ: BUY BUY BUY!

------
vbs_redlof
Share price is up ~6.5% haha.

------
bryang
It's about time....

------
jmaddox
Very sad news

------
xedeon
ABOUT time!!

------
snambi
it may be good for microsoft?

------
dabeeeenster
"retire"

~~~
kaonashi
It sounds better than "spending time with family" I suppose. He is almost 60.

------
kenshiro_o
Amen

------
monsterix
Nice. Microsoft does some really awesome research work and can easily come out
to position themselves as _leading_ the tech space again. Though some would
argue they already do, but that's not correct looking at the growth other
companies have demonstrated.

MS has had some massive misses, a couple of super bungled opportunities in the
past decade only because of the ageing 'bored' (pun intended) that thought
marketing is the only thing to drive innovation. I hope they find a
replacement that's good and that his/her selection is not _too much
influenced_ by the existing board or its psyche.

------
camus
Hmm , so who will be the new boss ? I think it should have been Sinofsky. He
delivered W7 which the best Windows ever period ( and i'm a linux fanboy ). W8
was not that great but i dont think he designed that whole Metro fiasco, Metro
came from the top. Anyway good luck MSFT.

~~~
yuhong
[http://hal2020.com/2013/07/12/doing-the-successor-
speculatio...](http://hal2020.com/2013/07/12/doing-the-successor-speculation-
shuffle/)

------
puzanop
PeterMartin_IG It's a bit damning that Microsoft is up 6% after CEO Steve
Ballmer announced he's retiring in 12 months. $MSFT

------
enupten
All hail the destroyer of Nokia.

------
MoreConsiderate
I'd like to officially announce my candidacy.

------
umarrana
i hope its not to late

------
toblender
I predict Marissa Mayer, will take the mantle.

~~~
toblender
What? I guess people don't like my prediction. Mad down votes.

~~~
warmfuzzykitten
I don't understand. Marissa Mayer would be a great choice for this job. I
doubt she would take it, because Microsoft is totally invested in the dying PC
business and she'd have to put up with whiny old Bill, but, hey, Yahoo didn't
look very good until she got there.

~~~
scholia
Apple bought Next and (accidentally) re-hired Jobs. Microsoft could, finally,
buy Yahoo and get Marissa Mayer. But I don't think it's going to happen ;-)

------
krmmalik
I don't have a resume that could even begin to get a second look for CEO for a
company this size, but boy oh boy would i love to take this position. CEO of
Microsoft or CEO of HP is something i'd absolutely love to do! Two companies I
think i could really fix - as I'm sure could a million others, but just in
case the recruiting firm is reading this and have decided to try a novel
approach and try someone with no former Fortune 500 CEO experience. You never
know. lol.

