01/11, 3:55pm
Blames drive shortages from Thailand floods
In two separate conferences in Las Vegas yesterday, Microsoft executives predicted that PC shipments industrywide for the fourth quarter of 2011 will be lower than expected. Tami Reller, chief financial officer and chief marketing officer of Microsoft's Windows and Windows Live Division, said that estimates of overall PC shipments were about one percent lower than expected. Reller made the remarks at a Nomura Holdings Inc. event yesterday. Bill Koefoed, Microsoft's general manager of investor relations, made similar remarks at a JPMorgan Chase & Co. conference. Koefoed said the actual number may be even lower.
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12/12, 5:00pm
Microsoft moves Windows Phone lead to special work
Microsoft's Windows Phone leader Andy Lees is being moved out of his existing role to work on a special cross-platform project, a leaked memo uncovered Monday. CEO Steve Ballmer told staff that Lees was working on a special project for next year that ZDNet understood would involve Microsoft support across PCs, phones, and tablets. The exact details weren't uncovered other than that Windows 8 and Windows Phone would be the key ingredients.
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11/15, 1:10pm
Microsoft CEO shrugs off threat to Windows
Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer during the company's annual shareholder's meeting made the declaration that Windows would never go away. When asked if the company was in a post-PC era, as Apple's late Steve Jobs said, he denied it completely, saying that Windows would always be at the forefront. The expansion of smartphones and tablets was a "fantastic thing," he said, since it only helped Microsoft.
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11/01, 9:25am
Leak shows Courier killed for lack of Office tech
Microsoft's decision to kill the Courier tablet came after a meeting with former CEO Bill Gates himself, according to a new leak on Tuesday. Not willing to decide on his own whether Microsoft should embrace the book-like Courier or a more conventional tablet, current CEO Steve Ballmer turned to a presentation with Gates judging a presentation by Courier architect J Allard, then Entertainment & Devices head Robbie Bach, and a pair of project engineers, CNET heard. Gates reportedly had a virtual "allergic reaction" when Allard revealed that the Courier's emphasis on drawing, note-taking, and other content plans meant it wouldn't have native e-mail or otherwise tap directly into the Office or Windows ecosystems.
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10/28, 5:15pm
Microsoft may have forced staffer out of Apple
Microsoft may have blackballed Apple's choice of datacenter head in the moves that ultimately led to Apple hiring from Yahoo, according an unusually detailed rumor. After fighting opposition from his immediate management on his way out, Kevin Timmons was supposedly met by CEO Steve Ballmer, SAI heard. Timmons may have had an "attitude" during the meeting that led to Ballmer reaching Apple directly, threatening legal action if Apple completed the hire.
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10/18, 10:35pm
Ballmer doesn't rule out in-house hardware
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has hinted that his company is not ruling out the possibility of creating its own smartphones. Although third-party manufacturers currently produce all of the devices running Windows Phone, the executive carefully skirted around a question from a Web 2.0 Summit attendee who asked if the company would build its own phone.
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10/03, 7:15pm
Microsoft SEC filing claims Ballmer underpaid
Microsoft in an SEC filing confirmed that CEO Steve Ballmer had been given his full possible rewards in his past year's pay. His regularly salary increased two percent to $682,500 for the fiscal year that ended in June but was also matched by a 100 percent bonus, giving him nearly $1.37 million for the year. Even combining this with a 3.95 percent share stake in the company, the committee determining his salary believed he was "underpaid" given his significance and achievements, the overseers said.
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05/31, 10:50pm
Approval rating drops to 29% in Q2
Despite recent reports suggesting Microsoft's board of directors is confident in CEO Steve Ballmer, the latest Glassdoor reviews suggest the executive's approval rating has continued to slide among the company's wider group of employees. Numbers from the most recent quarter suggest only 29 percent of Microsoft staffers approve of the executive, compared to 40 percent in the previous quarter.
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05/26, 9:55pm
Board said to support executive arrangement
Microsoft's board of directors reportedly supports executive Steve Ballmer, despite calls from hedge fund manager David Einhorn for the company to find a new leader. All board members are said to have confidence in Ballmer, unnamed sources familiar with the matter told Reuters, though the company has so far declined to make any public statements regarding the matter.
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05/25, 11:10pm
Hedge fund exec says Microsoft's Ballmer an anchor
Dissent around Microsoft's leadership became more public Wednesday with a speech from Greenlight Capital manager David Einhorn. The hedge fund operator told those at the Ira Sohn Investment Research Conference Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer had to "give someone else a chance" at the top spot. He considered the early Microsoft executive the "biggest overhang" on Microsoft's stock because he was mired in traditional behavior.
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05/19, 6:45pm
Microsoft closes experimental Pioneer Studios
New tips Thursday afternoon have pointed to and confirmed Microsoft shutting down its once-hopeful Pioneer Studios. Its creative workshop, best known for the ill-fated Courier tablet, has closed down its exotic office in Seattle and seen most staff either folded into existing groups or have left elsewhere. Microsoft didn't directly confirm the end to the studio with CNET but did say it was no longer occupying its custom-designed space.
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05/03, 11:00am
Bing integration to be at OS level
RIM during its BlackBerry World day two keynote on Tuesday landed a pair of key deals. Microsoft's Steve Ballmer took to the stage in an unusual move and promised that Bing would form the core search engine not just for Bing Maps, as on the BlackBerry PlayBook, but all BlackBerry devices. The feature would reach devices during the holiday season, but it wasn't said if this was for BlackBerry 7 or a future revision of the OS.
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04/21, 4:55pm
Company shifting away from stock awards
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has reportedly circulated a memo detailing a variety of changes to the company's compensation policies. The executive promises to increase compensation for employees at all levels, with a particular focus on workers involved in "early and mid-level R&D," or those located in specific regions.
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02/07, 10:50pm
Ballmer promoting senior engineers as top staff
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was said on Monday to be overhauling the company's executive structure in a bid to better compete against Apple and Google. The plan would promote senior engineers that would have experience in areas where Microsoft has historically been weak, such as in cloud computing, phones and tablets. The move tipped off to Bloomberg would likely be to get an understanding of what would truly be possible for future projects.
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12/01, 6:10pm
Jobs, Zuckerberg top CEO approvals while MS lags
An updated list of CEO approval ratings from Glassdoor has shown a wide disparity between some technology firms' executives. Apple's Steve Jobs, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Google's Eric Schmidt lead the group, all claiming 96 to 97 percent approval from their staff on the site. Rivals were much lower, however, and saw MySpace president Mike Jones at 60 percent, Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz at 56 and Microsoft's Steve Ballmer at a particularly low 49 percent.
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11/16, 6:45pm
Executives claim to have considered new strategies
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and chairman Bill Gates both argued against a shareholder's suggestion that it may be "time to consider breaking the company up." During a meeting with a number of shareholders, Ballmer proclaimed such a move would not be useful and might inadvertently lead to "economic dis-synergies."
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10/26, 1:30pm
Deal dealt blow to Mac gaming industry
Apple CEO Steve Jobs made an "angry" call to Microsoft head Steve Ballmer following the latter company's buyout of Bungie, a new interview reveals. Bungie was once one of the foremost Mac developers, having created popular game franchises like Myth and Marathon. The first Halo game was originally expected to be flagship Mac title, launching for Mac and Windows systems simultaneously; Jobs himself revealed plans during a 1999 Macworld conference.
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10/08, 8:35pm
Ballmer says Windows 7 only needs tweak for slate
Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer during a TechDays session in the UK told those gathered that there wouldn't be an in-between version of Windows 7 optimized for tablets. Mark Wilson and those in attendance were told Microsoft was "not going to do a revamp" before the next version of Windows arrived, which many expect in 2012. Optimizations to the user interface on particular devices, such as upsizing buttons, would make them much more touch- and pen-friendly.
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10/07, 4:25pm
Microsoft and Adobe in collaborative talks
Adobe and Microsoft have been talking about possibly collaborating against Apple or even a union between the two, sources said on Thursday. Their respective CEOs Shantanu Narayen and Steve Ballmer reportedly met for over an hour recently and discussed the possibility of teamwork to counter Apple's influence in the mobile world. Consultants and workers told the New York Times that they had gone so far as to float the option of Microsoft buying Adobe, although how serious this was isn't known.
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10/05, 10:05am
Microsoft CEO sees Windows iPad rivals by year end
Microsoft's tablet strategy accelerated on Tuesday with remarks from CEO Steve Ballmer that Windows-based rivals to the iPad would be in stores by the end of the year. In a presentation at the London School of Economics, he wouldn't name companies but said of the tablets that buyers would "see them this Christmas." The company had put in effort to make sure the tablets were suitable for creation and consumption, Reuters and students heard.
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07/31, 1:20pm
Editorial: Apple still faces tough succession
Recently, critics of Microsoft’s decision-makers have called on the company’s CEO, Steve Ballmer, to step down and give someone else with fresh ideas the opportunity to set the company’s direction. It’s a call that has been running through Redmond for years. And just as before, it won’t be enough to get Ballmer out of there. Perhaps, then, it’s time to turn our attention to Cupertino and Apple.
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