
Steve Ballmer steps down as board member at Microsoft - jtoeman
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2014/aug14/08-19steveb.aspx
======
kjjw
Thank you for all your cloud first, mobile first. I think that cloud first,
mobile first, but that cloud first, mobile first. If only cloud first, mobile
first,then cloud first, mobile first. But I digress, because what is really
important here is our cloud first, mobile first strategy, which will require
much cloud first, mobile first along with cloud first, mobile first.

I reckon Ballmer's PR drone won this one though. More words.

~~~
guiambros
Can't understand the snarkiness and silly jokes. I mean, I get it, this is
Steve Ballmer, the guy everyone loves to hate. But we can be better than that.

Of course the letter was carefully worded to sound like a press release; it
_is_ a press release.

But the entire memo strikes me as a thoughtful summary of what Microsoft will
face over the next 10 years. The company is transitioning from the cash cow of
software business to a much, much more complex environment. One driven by
platforms and ecosystems, built on top of open source stacks, where hardware
is key to the experience, frequently monetized by ad revenue.

The shareholders - who typically don't read HN - don't fully understand the
shift, and won't like the thinner margins. They want results, now. But some of
the bets - mobile, cloud, hardware - will take years to pay off, just like the
battle for home entertainment took 10+ years, and the judge is still out.

 _" Making that change while also managing the existing _[cash cow] _software
business... "_

This. The next 10 years won't be easy for Microsoft, and that's why Ballmer
mentioned - four times - that Nadella should be bold and not fear the
shareholders.

Also I don't understand why people are nitpicking with _mobile first, cloud
first_ wording. They're not mutually exclusive. It's about empowering
companies developing mobile experiences for their workforce, using cloud-based
systems. And figuring out how to make money.

~~~
andrewb
The only comment at this level which is constructive and thoughtful gets the
downvote?

My thoughts were there is nothing wrong with saying mobile-first and cloud-
first. They are complementary to each other. i.e. You build your mobile apps
using a cloud backend.

------
biot
The level of snark and juvenile responses in this thread is amazing.
Technically, all Ballmer had to write was "I resign my board position
effective immediately" and Nadella could have responded with "Acknowledged".
But the letters aren't meant for us. They are meant for investors who may cast
doubt onto Microsoft's future with such a key member of the board stepping
down. They also serve to reinforce the company's new direction of mobile and
cloud. Perhaps the letters are worded awkwardly, but let's not devolve HN into
a Reddit joke thread.

~~~
raverbashing
"They are meant for investors who may cast doubt onto Microsoft's future with
such a key member of the board stepping down."

Yeah, because Ballmer contributed so much to Microsoft. Just look at the stock
price
[http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=MSFT&t=my&l=on&z=l&q=l&c=](http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=MSFT&t=my&l=on&z=l&q=l&c=)

Ballmer was the CEO from January 2000 to February 2014

~~~
mynameisvlad
And that matters how? Any big decision like a board member stepping down or a
CEO resigning will cause investors to be in a panic. Having a carefully
drafted press release is the best way to go about the situation.

~~~
joezydeco
His point is that investors won't be panicking after 14 years of stock
performance like this. Almost any change will be an improvement.

------
k-mcgrady
>> I bleed Microsoft — have for 34 years and I always will.

No matter what you think about Ballmer you have to admit his passion for
Microsoft is unrivalled.

~~~
CamperBob2
His spelling needs a bit of work, though. There's only one 'e' in 'bled.'

~~~
zheshishei
"Bleed" is fine. He's referring to both the past and present. You can replace
"bleed" with "ooze", if that helps.

~~~
bshimmin
Or "squirt". (Do MS still do that, or did it stop with the demise of Zune?)

------
tobinharris
TL;DR

Steve Ballmer

    
    
        Bye. I'm outta here. 
        People to teach. Basketball to watch. You know.
        I'll write postcards and stuff.
        Love you. SB
        
        P.S - I've got all the shares.     
        
    

Satya Nadella

    
    
        Whatever. I've also got loads of shares too. 
        Keep your postcards. 
        L8r amigo.

~~~
stevenj
*Basketball to watch

~~~
tobinharris
Thanks. Corrected. The perils of being in the UK.

~~~
eps
It was "cricket" originally, wasn't it?

------
barkingcat
two pr teams talking to each other.

I would have written:

Steve to Satya: I love Microsoft, and I feel like I can trust you to take on
the world for me. Microsoft must live. Here, take some seasons tickets for the
Clippers.

Satya to Steve: Hey dude, I need to make Microsoft faster, leaner, and
stronger. I'm glad I passed the 1st date test with you and the rest of the
board. I'll take those seasons tickets now.

~~~
chimeracoder
Honestly, quite possibly the same PR team drafted both letters.

~~~
hnnewguy
> _quite possibly the same PR team drafted both letters._

How cynical are you people that you don't think long-time corporate executives
can sit down and write a professional, "safe" sounding, 500 word resignation
letter?

~~~
jerf
Why do you think that we think that's what happened because the two executives
"can't"?

I think it happened because both had lawyers looking it over due to the fact
both are operating in the heavily regulated space of high-level officers in
one of the world's largest publicly traded companies, and it would be
suicidally stupid to _not_ have lawyers looking over your every official
utterance... and while the words are in the lawyers hands, the PR department
might as well have a go too, since it's not a hard guess to think this could
go mobile-first, cloud-first... er... public.

------
xnull
Nobody actually communicates like that, in terms of company slogans like
cloud-first mobile-first and describing each other as having boldness and
innovation. Not even CEOs.

This is a crafted communication targeting information to Microsoft employees
and investors. It is not a 'leaked memo'.

I've heard it said that Ballmer's retirement had much more to do with
strategic board shuffling to prevent predatory dividend dumping from the
vulture capitol firm ValueAct Capitol.

~~~
hnnewguy
> _This is a crafted communication targeting information to Microsoft
> employees and investors. It is not a 'leaked memo'_.

Leaked memo? Who made that claim? It's posted on Microsoft's own website.

Carefully crafted? Uh, yeah, it's a resignation letter from a major corporate
executive that is publicly posted. Should it have some LOLs and emojis?

~~~
xnull
It has not been claimed that it was a leaked memo. I must apologize for the
imprecision of the word 'leaked'. 'Published' is a better word than 'leaked'
and should have used it instead.

To reiterate the point without the confusion regarding 'leaked': The media is
the message. The form of the news/announcement of the resignation came in
shape of a memoized email exchange, as if these actual words between Ballmer
and Satya were exchanged in this actual format.

I submit that they were not.

I submit that the substantial majority of the content was not written by or
for Satya nor by or for Ballmer, but that this announcement is for employees
and investors to read. I submit that it is also a method for Microsoft to
contextualize a complicated decision for the tech media and for the digestion
of the broader interested public.

------
jusben1369
It's very difficult for the new CEO and old CEO to be on the board together
for 100+ reasons. As stated this comes at the 6 month mark. I'm sure this was
all part of a carefully crafted calendar going back to the transition.

~~~
barkingcat
Bill and Steve were together on the board for a long time, but I think the
pair is the exception rather than the norm.

~~~
nostrademons
Eric Schmidt is still on Google's board.

Pierre Omidyar is still on EBay's board.

Reid Hoffman is still on LinkedIn's board.

It does seem to be more of an exception when the ex-CEO is not also a founder
(or someone very close to the founders, like Schmidt). Carly Fiorina is not on
HP's board, Meg Whitman is not on EBay's board (although, ironically, she is
on HP's). Lou Gerstner is not on IBM's board.

------
sargun
It's amazing to see what Ballmer stepping down from Microsoft has done.
Microsoft's stock has outperformed Google's in the past year:
[https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chfdeh=0&chdet=140847...](https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chfdeh=0&chdet=1408478400000&chddm=98923&cmpto=NASDAQ:GOOG;NASDAQ:MSFT&cmptdms=0;0&q=goog),
msft&ntsp=0&ei=qJbzU7D4JvLLiQLNuYCACg

~~~
davis
I think you'd be interested in reading Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel
Kahneman.

Specifically, he addresses CEO's as well as the stock market. I think equating
Ballmer's leaving of Microsoft to the stock market success is coincidental at
best.

------
kelukelugames
Five years ago I joined Microsoft. I have been neutral to pro-Ballmer the
whole time, but this chart explains why many people were unhappy with him.

[https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&...](https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=maximized&chdeh=0&chfdeh=0&chdet=1408478400000&chddm=543131&chls=IntervalBasedLine&cmpto=NASDAQ:AAPL;NASDAQ:GOOG;NASDAQ:AMZN;NYSEARCA:SPY&cmptdms=0;0;0;0&q=NASDAQ:MSFT&ntsp=0&ei=9pfzU8iLHsSyiAKN7IGoCA)

~~~
travem
True, this is a big part of it. However to calculate return people should also
consider the dividends that Microsoft has been paying out as well (for longer
than many competitors).

Starting on Jan 23rd 2009 (which is when the chart you linked to starts for
me) an investment of just under $10K (with reinvested dividends) would leave
you with just over $30k today [1] which is honestly not a bad return.

[1]
[http://www.microsoft.com/investor/Stock/StockSplit/stockcalc...](http://www.microsoft.com/investor/Stock/StockSplit/stockcalc.aspx)

~~~
frostmatthew
Sure that makes it outperform the S&P 500 over this arbitrary period, but
still falls short from the other companies. It makes more sense though to look
at it since he became CEO[1] in January of 2000. Now we see a _huge_
difference with MSFT the only one in negative territory and the other
companies having _massive_ returns. Reinvesting dividends over this period
would push this into positive territory, but it still wouldn't even outperform
the S%P 500 (22.57% vs 34.99%).

[1]
[https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&...](https://www.google.com/finance?chdnp=1&chdd=1&chds=1&chdv=1&chvs=maximized&chdeh=0&chfdeh=0&chdet=1408488110378&chddm=1433797&chls=IntervalBasedLine&cmpto=NASDAQ:AAPL;NASDAQ:GOOG;NASDAQ:AMZN;NYSEARCA:SPY&cmptdms=0;0;0;0&q=NASDAQ:MSFT&ntsp=0&ei=jdHzU-
jIFMqfrAHHp4GoCA)

------
georgeecollins
For those who don't speak corporate: " Under your leadership, we created an
incredible foundation that we continue to build on — and Microsoft will thrive
in the mobile-first, cloud-first world. " = your plan failed and here is what
we are going to do now instead

~~~
b_emery
Just change the and ("— and Microsoft") to "but Microsoft", and you get the
true meaning.

------
mark-r
Anybody struck by the number of times the word "bold" was used? What do you
suppose is the hidden meaning behind that?

~~~
larrys
An attempt to highlight how much gambling they will be doing going forward as
opposed to simply riding some (much easier) opportunity.

"Microsoft will need to be bold and make big bets to succeed in this new
environment. Writing great software is a tremendous accomplishment and selling
software has been a fabulous business. In the mobile-first, cloud-first world,
software development is a key skill, but success requires moving to
monetization through enterprise subscriptions, hardware gross margins, and
advertising revenues. Making that change while also managing the existing
software business well requires a boldness and fearlessness that I believe the
management team has."

"Big bets" \- we won't win everything we try or even come close. Some of the
things we do will make us look foolish.

"software development is a key skill, but success" (it's not the olden days
when we had a lock on things)

"moving to monetization through enterprise subscriptions, hardware gross
margins, and advertising revenues" (I'm not sticking around for this one, best
of luck!)

"well requires a boldness and fearlessness that I believe the management team
has" (but I"m not certain after all I didn't say "I'm sure" I said "I
believe".

Ballmer want's to leave the party before the end or at least when all the good
food and booze is gone.

------
jlebar
Boldness aside, this sentence struck me:

> I have confidence in our approach of mobile-first, cloud- > first, and in
> our primary innovation emphasis on platforms > and productivity and the
> building of capability in devices > and services as core business drivers.

That's a lot to have confidence in. Is this tangled web of nested lists
Microsoft's idea of "focus"? cf. Apple, Google, and Amazon's mission
statements.

~~~
gtirloni
Mission statements are usually pure BS. Microsoft is too big to have a single
focus. Google has discovered that recently. Apple is still having some focus,
but just made a joint PR with IBM about enterprise-y stuff.. so where's the
focus?

I'm trying to think of a huge company with a specifc focus and I can't.
Perhaps others can weight in here.

~~~
Systemic33
I'm quite certain Intel is pretty focused on making faster, smaller and more
efficient processors.

~~~
jamin
They certainly have their fingers in more pies than just processors.

------
mark_l_watson
Healthy thing for him to do. People should have two or three distinct careers,
in my opinion, in their lives. I hope he has a blast owning the Clippers and
teaching.

Off topic, but: I have been a bit negative on Microsoft since NT, which I
liked and helped me get work done. However, I like their direction with Office
365 for all devices and their high end Surface Pro 3.

------
tdicola
I'm surprised how short and to the point Satya's letter is to Steve. You would
think in the 20+ years they worked together he would relate some kind of
interesting or personal story. Instead it's pretty terse and reads like a
termination letter. I wonder if it was really Steve's choice to step down off
the board.

~~~
rwallace
For all I know, in the twenty plus years they worked together, they both
related lots of interesting and personal stories. Obviously Microsoft's PR
department decided the official announcement of change in leadership wasn't
the place for those, though. Remember the thing actually being communicated
here is "yes, this is all part of the plan - so there is no need to panic sell
Microsoft shares".

------
kordless
Dear Satya,

Sorry I forgot to give you the three envelopes.

Sincerely,

Steve

~~~
mturmon
Dear Satya,

As we discussed, this paves the way for you to use the first envelope.

Best wishes,

Steve

------
larrydag
"success requires moving to monetization through enterprise subscriptions,
hardware gross margins, and advertising revenues"

That's a big step for Microsoft. My opinion is that they are late on
subscriptions and ad revenues.

~~~
angersock
They were too busy building real value instead of chasing ad revenue for a
long time--I'm okay with that.

~~~
Pxtl
You mean churning by creating frameworks and brands and then dropping them
within a year or two?

Quick, what's their free email service called today?

~~~
angersock
outlook.com?

Also, note that Google/Apple can be quite gnarly about frameworks and brands,
right? How's that Wave thing going? Groups? Reader?

~~~
jenscow
Most of us who have been developing with the Microsoft stack have been burnt
at least twice with key frameworks/technologies that have been artificially
end-of-lifed while at their peak, leaving our projects based on obsolete
technologies at v1.

I suspect that is what the parent comment is about, and not immature projects
that were discontinued (with ample warning and exit) due mostly to lack of
interest, as mentioned in your counter-bicker.

~~~
Pxtl
Exactly. Linq2SQL, launched in .NET 3.5, superceded by EF in .NET 3.5SP1.
Silverlight, which was launched into a state of immediate torpor. XNA, first
release in 2006, last release 2010, incompatible with Windows 8 which was
launched in 2012. That's a pretty short lifespan for an entire development
environment, especially considering that most folks don't touch these things
on a first release.

And MS tools aren't just little libs. They're things that take a heavy time
investment to learn - they're practically languages and even IDEs in their own
right.

Almost every .NET release has _completely_ changed the data layer, RPC,
serialization. The only thing that hung on for a respectably long time was the
abominable trainwreck that was ASP.Net WebForms. Did anybody out there suffer
through WCF? Ouch.

This was Ballmer's microsoft.

The new MS has nothing anywhere close to that kind of churn, and the platforms
are developed out in the open.

------
apparentlykid
"I continue to love discussing the company’s future. I love trying new
products and sending feedback. I love reading about what is going on at the
company. Count on me to keep ideas and inputs flowing."

This describes Ballmer's 34 years at the company. I used to think highly (or
high-er) of him but it can't be clearer to me that him being appointed CEO was
the worst decision in the history of msft, leading to the lost decade. I don't
think he has any idea what he was doing - listen to his recent interview on
Bloomberg.

------
at-fates-hands
This sounds a lot like a pro athlete that realizes its time to really retire
and stop chasing his dreams from 10 years ago when he was able to play a
really high level.

------
vxNsr
A lot of people here are calling most of the letter marketing speak, that may
be true, but Satya has been talking about mobile-first cloud-based since he
became CEO, like I haven't seen him do a single interview or public appearance
where he doesn't mention _at least_ one of the two things.

~~~
apparentlykid
New CEO's - or even existing ones - only have so many things they can openly
talk about. Listen to Marissa's interviews over the past year - I had to since
I was preparing for an interview and the repetition in her talk was almost
maddening!

------
paul_f
Has any other corporate CEO generated more profits during his watch than Steve
Ballmer? Not sure if this true but I suspect it might be.

------
dserban
What is with this trend of e-mail correspondence between high-level people at
big companies being available to the general public?

------
jaoued
So funny Cloud first, Mobile first... Henry Mintzberg would say that this is
an inward focus statement telling and reminding MS employees what their focus
should be. Bottom line : no many great mobile apps on MS devices...

------
tyler_ball
He's got bigger things to do:
[http://instagram.com/p/r2jjTdhQFx/](http://instagram.com/p/r2jjTdhQFx/)

~~~
cwyers
Am I the only person who started shouting "Developers! Developers!
Developers!" at the screen while watching this?

~~~
_random_
Yes.

------
AVTizzle
Watch as MSFT's stock jumps.

------
make3
boldness bold boldness bold boldd bold.. ness.

~~~
markab21
Yeah, it read like a BBQ sauce commercial.

Sweet Baby Rays - big bold taste.

------
bagrow
Clippers! Clippers! Clippers!

~~~
xtc
I think Clippys is now a more suitable name.

~~~
whoopdedo
"I see that you're trying to post up. Would you like me to set a screen?"

~~~
lotharbot
I love how that matches Clippy's standard incompetence, since generally
speaking screens are for creating openings to drive or take jumpers. Sometimes
you see a screen designed to get a guy into good post position, but usually
not.

------
pkozlowski_os
Bla, bla, bal... How about showing us some great products instead?

------
blueskin_
Microsoft is a spent force these days. Yes, they missed the opportunity to
jump onto phones, but destroying their entire business and alienating all
their customers is a complete overreaction.

Shame though, I liked Windows before they tried to slap the UI from a mobile
phone onto it.

------
foxhill
some people are born without the ability to walk.

others, are born without the gift of hearing.

i was born with an incredibly low "cringe" threshold.

reading this "exchange" almost put me in a coma.

------
UVB-76
How out of touch does a corporation have to be to announce the resignation of
a board member in this manner?

~~~
kelukelugames
I'm hoping the target audience is 50 year old millionare shareholders and not
us peasant folks.

------
dwelch2344
"Mobile-first, cloud-first"... I've used their cloud and even our .NET fanboys
voted it off the island at our shop.

And mobile first? Do they even have a mobile offering? I mean, sure, the Slate
is kind of cool. But doesn't your company need marketshare to say that you're
"mobile-first"?

~~~
logn
What they mean is that in the face of criticism exactly such as yours, that
Microsoft will not revert to server-closet, workstation first in order to keep
the easy flow of cash coming. Think AOL at the start of the broadband era.
Microsoft doesn't want to become a mindless machine with ever dwindling
returns.

~~~
marcosdumay
Funny thing.

Has the cloud market already become larger than the server market? And has the
mobile market already become larger than the desktop/laptop market?

I ask because there are always lots of markets that appear, grow like crazy,
stealing money from another related market, and then saturate, without ever
getting bigger than the original one. The trend we saw in computers - where
every new generation brings a cheaper incumbent that plainly wins is an
exception, not the rule.

I'd be quite open about a new generation of computers being an exception
again, I even tought they'd be for a while. But there is no way the mobile
(phones + tablet) market will grow a lot anymore. How many phones does a
person need? The cloud (IaS) market has space to grow, but so do servers, and
each has its own set of advantajes, thus there's no reason to imagine that the
cloud will "win" while servers "lose".

~~~
logn
I think that the cloud will win, if only because it's the logical first step
for any small customer (which you can later up-sell). And large customers will
be won over when you tell them they never have to upgrade again and that
uptime/security is guaranteed by an SLA. Businesses love eliminating liability
and risk, and theoretically the cloud can win on both counts.

Also, I think mobile-first will win via the web and because mobile is the
lowest common denominator (you can put a qwerty keyboard and browser on any
full computer).

My $.02 though, it's a huge gamble for Microsoft to beat others in this space.
If I were Microsoft I'd be buying Pandora, Redbox, Sirius XM, expanding MSNBC,
and putting more into Xbox. That space is all about negotiating with parties
and exploiting your dominance, which they've proved to be masters at over the
years. For Microsoft to win in the cloud and mobile, I think they need to
embrace open source and common platforms similar to IBM and Oracle, and I
think they can never summon that desire.

------
jere
You know those extensions that replace 'cloud' with 'butt'? It might be
worthwhile to replace the entire phrase 'mobile-first, cloud-first world' with
'butt':

>In the _butt_ , software development is a key skill...

>Under your leadership, we created an incredible foundation that we continue
to build on — and Microsoft will thrive in the _butt_.

