About time! http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2013/aug13/08-23AnnouncementPR.aspx Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months Aug. 23, 2013 Board of directors initiates succession process; Ballmer remains CEO until successor is named. REDMOND, Wash. — Aug. 23, 2013 — Microsoft Corp. today announced that Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer has decided to retire as CEO within the next 12 months, upon the completion of a process to choose his successor. In the meantime, Ballmer will continue as CEO and will lead Microsoft through the next steps of its transformation to a devices and services company that empowers people for the activities they value most. “There is never a perfect time for this type of transition, but now is the right time,” Ballmer said. “We have embarked on a new strategy with a new organization and we have an amazing Senior Leadership Team. My original thoughts on timing would have had my retirement happen in the middle of our company’s transformation to a devices and services company. We need a CEO who will be here longer term for this new direction.” The Board of Directors has appointed a special committee to direct the process. This committee is chaired by John Thompson, the board’s lead independent director, and includes Chairman of the Board Bill Gates, Chairman of the Audit Committee Chuck Noski and Chairman of the Compensation Committee Steve Luczo. The special committee is working with Heidrick & Struggles International Inc., a leading executive recruiting firm, and will consider both external and internal candidates. “The board is committed to the effective transformation of Microsoft to a successful devices and services company,” Thompson said. “As this work continues, we are focused on selecting a new CEO to work with the company’s senior leadership team to chart the company’s course and execute on it in a highly competitive industry.” “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.” Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential. Note to editors: For more information, news and perspectives from Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft News Center at http://www.microsoft.com/news. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication, but may have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/news/contactpr.mspx.
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I'll start this off by naming just one thing: The failure in mobile. If Apple and Google hadn't blown past Microsoft like it was a dead tree stump, the announcement today wouldn't have happened. <iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/eywi0h_Y5_U" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Seriously? MSFT is trading below where it was when he took over. They've missed the boat, repeatedly, on pretty much ever move they've made to try and keep up with the joneses (mp3 players, smartphones, tablets, SaaS, search, maps... Pretty much every thing they've tried they've played copycat and with less success). Meanwhile Ballmer has a net worth north of $15 billion. Not sure how its even questionable. Dude took over probably the number 1 company in his industry... A behemoth. Cograts for not completely decimating it, but c'mon. MSFT is of course still a huge machine, but the 4 horseman are Facebook, GOOGLE, Apple and Amazon now. Ballmers run as CEO has to be described as a failure, imo
Wow I didn't kno the dude is so cheesy and contrived in his presentations lol it's just not good to have your CEO be that contrived about his enthusiasm. Good for MSFT
I didn't keep up with the nuts and bolts of MSFT. All I knew was that revenues and profits have been up solidly under his tenure from glancing at the headlines. It looks like revs have grown at 8% a year or so which is pretty solid for a company that large. I knew they sucked at mobile stuff, but Xbox has worked out pretty well. The stock price was a function of p/e multiple compression. I googled it and back when he took over the stock had about a 43 p/e. I dunno it seems like most of the problem comes when you compare him to Steve Jobs. He certainly isn't him, but he isn't like he was as horrible as a Leo Apotaker was. I don't know how he can be called a failure when he consistently grew revs. That doesn't magically happen in business. Also his net worth I think is mostly tied up in the stock he has owned since he started there. I don't know how you can criticize him for that.
Office, Windows, SQl server, Windows server, .net, etc. The things that make most of the money aren't really his products. Xbox isn't that profitable, Bing is not profitable, Windows 7 was good, but windows 8 sucked. You could argue none of those are really his products either. Mobile completely flopped when they had a pretty big lead in the early smartphone space.
I think too much blame is being placed on him for Microsoft not leading the way in mobile, tablets, etc... As was mentioned, the company has been profitable under his reign. He's not an inventor, innovator, engineer, etc... He's a CEO...which means he directs and manages. Im sure if he could go back, he'd change a few decisions he made, but his entire body of work is not a failure when the company went from a huge company to an even bigger company. You dont get to to a net worth of over 15 billion by sucking.
Their innovation under Ballmer has been an absolute disaster. They are consistently behind in seeing trends and changes in the market and constantly missing the boat (social, phones, tablets, etc). Their marketing of the good products they do produce has been terrible. They are constantly losing talent to the other tech giants. On and on - I think it's hard to argue that he's done a particularly good job. This isn't solely Ballmer, but he's had forever to reform the organization and hasn't done it at all. Here's a great article on the ridiculousness of Microsoft's talent strategy: http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2012/07/microsoft-downfall-emails-steve-ballmer.print Eichenwald’s conversations reveal that a management system known as “stack ranking”—a program that forces every unit to declare a certain percentage of employees as top performers, good performers, average, and poor—effectively crippled Microsoft’s ability to innovate. “Every current and former Microsoft employee I interviewed—every one—cited stack ranking as the most destructive process inside of Microsoft, something that drove out untold numbers of employees,” Eichenwald writes. “If you were on a team of 10 people, you walked in the first day knowing that, no matter how good everyone was, 2 people were going to get a great review, 7 were going to get mediocre reviews, and 1 was going to get a terrible review,” says a former software developer. “It leads to employees focusing on competing with each other rather than competing with other companies.” This is wretched, incompetent management.
I think it will be interesting to see what happens in his transition. MS needs to bring in a guy who will be objective, make the hard decisions that Ballmer couldn't. Maybe that means the death to two peripherals I love (Surface and WP8), but it might build a stronger company in the end. I think MS is beyond lost in terms of marketing. The surface is a damn good product, but we get ads of people dancing and I'm not sure if it's a tech ad or an ad for a new Bollywood flick. They should have sold it as a cheaper iPad that runs office. The same goes for WP8. For 3 years WP has been able to run full office, what do we see in the ads? Garbage. The "don't fight, switch" ads are funny, but they don't sell the product. Heck, there are even a couple of damn good reasons to switch from Google to Bing, but all we hear are the damn dings in the ads and that's it. I think with the leadership this company can do some real damage, I'm not so sure that guy should be Ballmer or in the mold of Ballmer anymore.
i'm in constant talk with some people at Microsoft those dudes have ZERO budget for marketing apparantly. meanwhile Google buys up cool little gifts to give everyone like it's nothing, and holds huge events all the time. it's not a good look. i think like 99% of the people I know would rather work for Google over Microsoft. they've just lost the vibe, if they ever had it.
I like how they market Surface. I also like their Microsoft store better than Apple's. Too bad they were just behind in coming out with those things.
I think some of their Windows 8 ads were awesome - but the Surface goofy dancing people on their TV ads are kind of ridiculous, especially when the whole idea behind Surface is that it's better for getting things done. They are fighting a losing battle to be "cool" compared to Apple - they need to focus on what they are good at. Their "really?" phone ads were just silly - they were trying to convey that their smartphone had a bunch of benefits over other smartphones, but never explained how. Instead, they came across as "smartphones suck, so buy our smartphone!" That said, the ads certainly have gotten better overall compared to several years back. The Windows 8 ads had a good combo of "cool" and "how this actually helps me" to them: http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/2012/windows-8-reimagined-globally/
It makes me want a Surface... It isn't just the goofy dancing and fun keyboard locking stuff, but also the direct ads comparing to the iPad. "I can't do that" A lot of the surface ads are combinations with Windows 8, which more or less were made for each other.
I love the MS stores. They are great. They sell more than a product, they show you a window into an ecosystem. It's like an Apple Store to the 10th degree, it goes beyond what a traditional apple store does. The surface ads are garbage. I wanna trade in my RT for a pro (I love my RT, I just need an ultrabook to replace my current Sony) but I'm waiting to see how the Surface 2 does/looks.
