4 ms·

I've always felt MS is two businesses, an enterprise systems (Office, SQL Server, Project, Dynamics, Azure) business and a consumer devices business (Windows, X

by d4nt 13y ago

I've always felt MS is two businesses, an enterprise systems (Office, SQL Server, Project, Dynamics, Azure) business and a consumer devices business (Windows, Xbox, Phone, Bing) which should have started building hardware sooner than it did. They really need to either spin off a separate business, sell some divisions or just stop trying to compete in some areas. Experience shows their OS dominance doesn't count for much in the phone, tablet, search or cloud markets.

jasonlotito 13y ago
Cloud market? You mean Azure, which I last heard held 20% of the market. Is that what you mean?
- d4nt 13y ago
  Yes, Azure. It's developed into a good offering and I'm pleased for them that they're doing well. But, there was a time when Microsoft entering a market would send all the existing players running for the hills. They used their OS dominance to control what software OEMs installed and killed off every desktop software competitor they ever had. Your best hope was to sell your company to them. But they couldn't do that with the phone, tablet, search or cloud markets. They've built some good products and some of them are doing ok, but they haven't had the kind of automatic win in those markets that those of us around in the 90s remember.
  - mathattack 13y ago
    Their dominance over Netscape scared a lot of people. "What if Microsoft comes in and gives everything away for free to keep the OS monopoly?" was a legit fear. Gates was simultaneously a product master, and very competitive. Sometime between then and now people stopped fearing them. Maybe it was the delays in getting products out? Or false starts? Or that they just started playing nicer? Nobody is close to unseating them on the desktop, but the excitement is everywhere else.
mathattack 13y ago
I was thinking there wasn't much synergy if you're just using the profits of one business as a VC pool for the rest. Better to give the cash back to shareholders and let the market decide which to fund.

by d4nt 13y ago

jasonlotito 13y ago

Cloud market? You mean Azure, which I last heard held 20% of the market. Is that what you mean?

d4nt 13y ago
Yes, Azure. It's developed into a good offering and I'm pleased for them that they're doing well. But, there was a time when Microsoft entering a market would send all the existing players running for the hills. They used their OS dominance to control what software OEMs installed and killed off every desktop software competitor they ever had. Your best hope was to sell your company to them. But they couldn't do that with the phone, tablet, search or cloud markets. They've built some good products and some of them are doing ok, but they haven't had the kind of automatic win in those markets that those of us around in the 90s remember.
- mathattack 13y ago
  Their dominance over Netscape scared a lot of people. "What if Microsoft comes in and gives everything away for free to keep the OS monopoly?" was a legit fear. Gates was simultaneously a product master, and very competitive. Sometime between then and now people stopped fearing them. Maybe it was the delays in getting products out? Or false starts? Or that they just started playing nicer? Nobody is close to unseating them on the desktop, but the excitement is everywhere else.

mathattack 13y ago

I was thinking there wasn't much synergy if you're just using the profits of one business as a VC pool for the rest. Better to give the cash back to shareholders and let the market decide which to fund.