17 ms·

Worries That Microsoft Is Too Tricky to Manage

39 points by kemoly 13y ago

nazgulnarsil 13y ago
It's worrying for MS that for all the major divisions shown in that image, I've never once thought of or used them in relation to each other. MS has no unifying experience to build on in consumer consciousness.
- joseph_cooney 13y ago
  I dunno...I think Exchange and Office (outlook) work OK together, but that is probably the exception that proves the rule.
  - matsur 13y ago
    Exchange is in the Office division.
    - joseph_cooney 13y ago
      I thought Exchange was part of Microsoft Platform Products and Services Division, whereas office is part of Microsoft Business Division.
      - matsur 13y ago
        Nope. http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/ http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/
        joseph_cooney 13y ago
        Perhaps I was misinformed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Product_Divisions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Product_Divisions
- Encosia 13y ago
  That may be true for your average HN user, but Microsoft products generally work pretty darn well with other Microsoft products. There are always exceptions, but as someone who works with small businesses often, I don't see any obvious silo'ing in how they use products from those different divisions in their real-world work. Cross-quadrant dynamic synergies where the rubber meets the road and pivots, off the top of my head: - IE (technically part of the Windows division) and Xbox tie in with Bing (in Win 8.1, Windows itself searches Bing and builds OS-native search results pages that aggregate Bing results with results from the local machine). - As Live Messenger, Lync, and Skype converge, Office should have good integration with whatever eventual amalgamation emerges since it already does so with Lync. - Office and Bing. "Search with Bing" is right in the context menu for selected text throughout Office apps. - SQL Server and SharePoint aren't depicted in the image, but Office has great built-in support for working against SQL Server data and SharePoint lists seamlessly. - I don't know the official word about Azure, but I would be shocked if at least portions of services like Xbox Live and Office 365 aren't using the Azure infrastructure (if it's good enough for iCloud...). - Skype and Windows have a bit of affinity in Win 8.1 too. The Skype app can raise a call notification even when the computer is locked and you can answer Skype calls directly from the Windows 8.1 lock screen. - A killer, overarching connection between groups is the newish Microsoft Accounts. When you log into a Windows 8+ machine with your MS Account, settings for a lot of apps are synced automatically. Even the progress I've made on Angry Birds is automatically synced between my desktops, laptops, and tablets. I'm not sure exactly which quadrants that connects (all?), but it's a great example of MS divisions working well together.
  - yuhong 13y ago
    This reminds me of the HTML export in Word/Excel 2013, which is pretty much unchanged from 2003, complete with setting "Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 or later" in Web Options causing things like VML to be required that is not supported by IE10 anymore by default. I wrote an Ars Technica forum post on this.
  - RyanZAG 13y ago
    Hold on, are you saying the big integration effort between the different Microsoft products is the ability to search with Bing inside random applications and devices? Come on, this is not something any consumer would ever see as a value add. This is a waste of resources, nothing more. Integration is only integration if it adds value. No wonder Microsoft is dieing if this is the kind of thing they are wasting time on instead of useful features. Who would ever want to search with Bing from their xbox?! The awful Microsoft Accounts just gives consumers one new and popular question to ask: how do I turn off Microsoft Accounts? That's literally the most asked question in regards to that piece of terrible functionality. Come on anybody at Microsoft reading this, get rid of people like this and focus on giving consumers something they actually want. You might be able to turn this around if you act quickly.
pedalpete 13y ago
Why is this a worry for Microsoft, but not Google and Apple? This isn't really tackled until the last sentence of the article, and even then, they say that Google and Apple are more focused. Is that correct? or do Google and Apple just have one larger profit maker with many smaller profit-makers or loss-leaders?
- Aloisius 13y ago
  There really is no comparison between the number of products and divisions Microsoft has compared to Google or Apple. For goodness sakes, Microsoft Studios probably has more video games that it developed than Google has products. Put another way, Microsoft makes alternatives for all the products that both Google and Apple combined make plus a gaming division and enterprise software.
- runn1ng 13y ago
  As a matter of fact, yes. Apple has a very few products and is quite famous for that. Google is focused on selling ads. Yes, it has a lot of other products, but in the end, most of them are about selling ads (and getting more information about the user, so they can sell ads better). What is Microsoft focused on?
  - bigdubs 13y ago
    Microsoft is focused on selling windows licenses. The xbox and its ecosystem is the exception.
    - rdl 13y ago
      "Windows licenses" alone probably include more distinct SKUs than Apple has total products. A lot of that is just inherent to enterprise vs. consumer, but even then, Microsoft has lots of complexity, seemingly on purpose, while Apple tried to be minimalist.
      - nightski 13y ago
        There are only 2 SKUs of Windows 8 that I know of. Standard and Pro. (At least that you purchase directly, not already on a device).
Killah911 13y ago
Props to the illustrator who came up with the graphic at the top... a broken window... brilliant!
YeahKIA 13y ago
It is mu h a worry as a factor that makes the company much stable as compared to some others it competes with. Look at BlackBerry or Nokia. Their fall from grace was precipitous. Google and to some extent Apple are one trick ponies. Although its a damn good trick, its risky to only know how to make money doing only one thing.
danso 13y ago
> An oft-cited example of this is the reluctance of the Office applications group to release complete versions of Word, Excel and other software for iPads and Android devices. That decision, in theory, could help Microsoft tablets that run Windows, though it hasn’t yet...An even broader conglomerate is Samsung, which is in areas as varied as electronics, life insurance and petrochemicals. But each of those businesses is run with a high degree of independence from the others. The company supplies screens and semiconductors for Apple, even though Apple is the main rival to Samsung’s mobile phone business. The Samsung software layer on their Android phones was so awful, so devoid of inspiration, that even as an Android user, I hoped that Apple would continue to spank them in the phone industry. But I highly respect whosever management decision it was to keep Samsung's units as independent as possible, even so that one hand of the company may be helping to spank the other. Perhaps it's because Apple's business is too good to lose, but hopefully there's some "a rising tide lifts all ships" mentality in there. Meanwhile, Microsoft could've ported Office and given it a good foothold as the productivity software of mobile and the cloud..but by the time they've waited for the Surface to become a success, Google and Apple may both eat its lunch
moca 13y ago
It is tricky to manage any large company. The more tricky problem for Microsoft is that it heavily depends on old business models. A significant portion of Microsoft profit comes from Windows and Office. Other companies, like Google, can offer competitive products almost for free. That could happen eventually. It won't take Google too much efforts to provide a desktop version of Android and Office-like product. Even at several billion dollars R&D cost, it is still much cheaper than Motorola purchase. Microsoft enterprise business is hugely competitive. But other than that, it is hard to achieve meaningful profit margin (xbox may earn couple of billions, internet services always lose money, Nokia probably break even for next few years). So the problem is more about innovate than manage Microsoft.
- jpatokal 13y ago
  Why would Google develop a desktop Android or Office, when they've already got this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrome_OS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrome_OS
  - pjmlp 13y ago
    Because it sucks?
    - frozenport 13y ago
      I would like to second this opinion. I have used Google tools to collaborate but always needed to post process the results in a real presentation make program like Office or Latex.
    - Zigurd 13y ago
      At the current state of development, Google has a problem: Android is by far the better general-purpose OS, but Google Drive's office productivity apps suck REALLY bad on Android. If they were implemented to the same standard as Android's GMail app, Windows would have a lot to worry about. But as it is, Android isn't going to displace any enterprise desktops this week.
fauigerzigerk 13y ago
I think things will become much much worse for Microsoft before they get better. I'm afraid they will lose small and medium size enterprises and ISVs because their licensing structure has become so complex, overpriced and antiquated that a new generation of customers will refuse to deal with them. In the past there was piracy as a way to lower the barriers to entry. Today, piracy has become dangerous for small companies in developed countries. All of a sudden SMEs and ISVs are confronted with scores of product feature matrices, weird dependencies and restrictions, kafkaesque partnership programs and long-term committments. Sometimes they are just plain stupid. For instance, I recently came across this page that explains developer account types: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/apps/jj863494.aspx http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/apps/jj863494.aspx It seems harmless if convoluted at first sight. But look at the dependencies they have created. In order to sell Windows desktop apps in the Windows store and use all device capabilities you need a company account, and to get a company account you need to be recognized as a company in your own country. That's effectively a wholesale import of tax, social security and incorporation laws of countless countries into Microsoft's own terms of service. Microsoft operates in many countries so they have to know how onerous this rule can be. They are erecting a huge barrier to entry for individual software developers and early stage startups around the world. I'm sure they will claim it's for their users' safety. But this must be the most uncreative, idiotic safety measure ever invented, particularly if you know how easy it is for real criminals to game this system. Now, I'm not saying that developer relations is Microsoft's most serious problem. Not at all. But it goes to show how incapable this company is of putting themselves into the shoes of those who have to deal with them in any capacity.
- bad_user 13y ago
  > In order to sell Windows desktop apps in the Windows store and use all device capabilities you need a company account, and to get a company account you need to be recognized as a company in your own country There are valid reasons for doing that. In Europe for example one reason would be VAT handling. It may very well be that they were forced in doing this. But, in European countries at least, you have the option to register as a Sole Proprietorship. Depending on the country of course, this is painless to do, accounting is simpler and taxes are much better (in comparison with starting a LLC and paying yourself a salary). It has downsides of course, but for developers trying to experiment it is perfect.
orionblastar 13y ago
Ever since Ballmer took over, Microsoft is just scoring 'Own Goals'. Microsoft used to think that Apple was their enemy, that IBM was their enemy, that Sun was their enemy, that Oracle was their enemy, that Google was their enemy? Well Microsoft is their own worst enemy! In fact we have entered a Post-PC, Post-Microsoft era. Apple knew it was Post-PC and invested in smartphone and tablets and knew the desktop GUI would not work in mobile devices. So iOS got a different GUI/UI than Mac OSX has. Microsoft does not get that, a Desktop GUI for all products! Hey why'd we lose $900M in Surface sales? Oh well better buy out Nokia who failed to turn profits selling Windows Mobile 8 phones named Lumina, and rebrand them as 'Surface' phone so they will sell better. Microsoft has to fix their broken business model, they tried to steal Apple's model and it backfired on them because they aren't Apple (Duh!) and they don't manage things the same way Apple does. Steve Ballmer is no Steve Jobs or Tim Cook, and he should understand why. Instead of fixing what is wrong with their products and services, they just 'rebrand' them under a different name. Lumina becomes Surface phone, Zune Music Player becomes XBox Music. Windows 8 gets updated to Windows 8.1 and adds the Windows logo where the Start Menu used to be and it takes you to the Start Page in the Metro UI. But where are the visual clues on how to find the Charms Bar? Where are any visual clues at all in the Metro UI? Why is Windows 8.X the first version of Windows not to have visual clues to the user in some form? Of course the desktop part has them, minimize, maximize, close buttons on Windows. But Metro UI does not. If I were Tim Cook I would not worry about Microsoft taking away anything Apple has done. I would just develop a less expensive version of the iPhone and iPad series, perhaps the iPhone Lite or iPad Lite that can compete with Surface phones and tablets in price. Then let customers decide when the iOS versions have the visual clues and a UI that works for mobile devices and Surface does not.
mherdeg 13y ago
Wow, the "Mini-Microsoft" blog is now nearly a decade old! Interesting that it doesn't get called out in the Times article, except implicitly by name in the paragraph at "A list of missed opportunities and disappointing investments at the company in the past decade in areas like smartphones, tablets and Internet search have led to the belief that a more focused, nimble collection of mini-Microsofts could respond more effectively to the never-ending flow of disruptive technologies nibbling at its foundations." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini-Microsoft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini-Microsoft)
netcan 13y ago
One thing that doesn't seem to come through in all these pundit articles and internet discussions is how fantastically successful MS are. They've survived several paradigms over decades in a business where most didn't. Most years (including the last few) they make more money than the year before. They have a bunch of very big businesses that make big money. Compare that to Google. Google do lots of cool things: self driving cars, webmail. glass, android. Cool stuff. Still, almost all their money comes from search/adwords/adsense. They have lots of faults. I really dislike Windows. But, they have a lot of good traits too that others should emulate. A big one is stubborn survivey-ness. Just because an MS thing is still lame 2 years after it was launched doesn't mean it won't make it. They can stick at lame products until they make them decent. Bottom line I guess is that MS are survivors. I expect them to survive.
Zigurd 13y ago
If I were King of Microsoft I would break it into two companies: 1. Take ex-Nokia handsets, XBOX, and all the miscellaneous hardware and consumer software and cloud services and call that Microsoft Devices and Services. 2. Take Windows 8 for PCs and servers, Office, everything enterprise and call it Azure, Inc. Spin the two entities out to shareholders and reap the gains from letting investors own the thing they want to own, and from managers managing the thing they want to manage in the direction they want to go. Azure would end up licensing a good deal of stuff to MD&S, but both entities could end up with a strong licensing business to third parties, too. That would be nice, but I agree with fauigerzigerk: "...things will become much much worse for Microsoft before they get better"

39 points by kemoly 13y ago

It's worrying for MS that for all the major divisions shown in that image, I've never once thought of or used them in relation to each other. MS has no unifying experience to build on in consumer consciousness.

joseph_cooney 13y ago
I dunno...I think Exchange and Office (outlook) work OK together, but that is probably the exception that proves the rule.
- matsur 13y ago
  Exchange is in the Office division.
  - joseph_cooney 13y ago
    I thought Exchange was part of Microsoft Platform Products and Services Division, whereas office is part of Microsoft Business Division.
    - matsur 13y ago
      Nope. http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/ http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/
      - joseph_cooney 13y ago
        Perhaps I was misinformed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Product_Divisions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Product_Divisions
Encosia 13y ago
That may be true for your average HN user, but Microsoft products generally work pretty darn well with other Microsoft products. There are always exceptions, but as someone who works with small businesses often, I don't see any obvious silo'ing in how they use products from those different divisions in their real-world work. Cross-quadrant dynamic synergies where the rubber meets the road and pivots, off the top of my head: - IE (technically part of the Windows division) and Xbox tie in with Bing (in Win 8.1, Windows itself searches Bing and builds OS-native search results pages that aggregate Bing results with results from the local machine). - As Live Messenger, Lync, and Skype converge, Office should have good integration with whatever eventual amalgamation emerges since it already does so with Lync. - Office and Bing. "Search with Bing" is right in the context menu for selected text throughout Office apps. - SQL Server and SharePoint aren't depicted in the image, but Office has great built-in support for working against SQL Server data and SharePoint lists seamlessly. - I don't know the official word about Azure, but I would be shocked if at least portions of services like Xbox Live and Office 365 aren't using the Azure infrastructure (if it's good enough for iCloud...). - Skype and Windows have a bit of affinity in Win 8.1 too. The Skype app can raise a call notification even when the computer is locked and you can answer Skype calls directly from the Windows 8.1 lock screen. - A killer, overarching connection between groups is the newish Microsoft Accounts. When you log into a Windows 8+ machine with your MS Account, settings for a lot of apps are synced automatically. Even the progress I've made on Angry Birds is automatically synced between my desktops, laptops, and tablets. I'm not sure exactly which quadrants that connects (all?), but it's a great example of MS divisions working well together.
- yuhong 13y ago
  This reminds me of the HTML export in Word/Excel 2013, which is pretty much unchanged from 2003, complete with setting "Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 or later" in Web Options causing things like VML to be required that is not supported by IE10 anymore by default. I wrote an Ars Technica forum post on this.
- RyanZAG 13y ago
  Hold on, are you saying the big integration effort between the different Microsoft products is the ability to search with Bing inside random applications and devices? Come on, this is not something any consumer would ever see as a value add. This is a waste of resources, nothing more. Integration is only integration if it adds value. No wonder Microsoft is dieing if this is the kind of thing they are wasting time on instead of useful features. Who would ever want to search with Bing from their xbox?! The awful Microsoft Accounts just gives consumers one new and popular question to ask: how do I turn off Microsoft Accounts? That's literally the most asked question in regards to that piece of terrible functionality. Come on anybody at Microsoft reading this, get rid of people like this and focus on giving consumers something they actually want. You might be able to turn this around if you act quickly.

pedalpete 13y ago

Why is this a worry for Microsoft, but not Google and Apple? This isn't really tackled until the last sentence of the article, and even then, they say that Google and Apple are more focused. Is that correct? or do Google and Apple just have one larger profit maker with many smaller profit-makers or loss-leaders?

Aloisius 13y ago
There really is no comparison between the number of products and divisions Microsoft has compared to Google or Apple. For goodness sakes, Microsoft Studios probably has more video games that it developed than Google has products. Put another way, Microsoft makes alternatives for all the products that both Google and Apple combined make plus a gaming division and enterprise software.
runn1ng 13y ago
As a matter of fact, yes. Apple has a very few products and is quite famous for that. Google is focused on selling ads. Yes, it has a lot of other products, but in the end, most of them are about selling ads (and getting more information about the user, so they can sell ads better). What is Microsoft focused on?
- bigdubs 13y ago
  Microsoft is focused on selling windows licenses. The xbox and its ecosystem is the exception.
  - rdl 13y ago
    "Windows licenses" alone probably include more distinct SKUs than Apple has total products. A lot of that is just inherent to enterprise vs. consumer, but even then, Microsoft has lots of complexity, seemingly on purpose, while Apple tried to be minimalist.
    - nightski 13y ago
      There are only 2 SKUs of Windows 8 that I know of. Standard and Pro. (At least that you purchase directly, not already on a device).

Killah911 13y ago

Props to the illustrator who came up with the graphic at the top... a broken window... brilliant!

YeahKIA 13y ago

It is mu h a worry as a factor that makes the company much stable as compared to some others it competes with. Look at BlackBerry or Nokia. Their fall from grace was precipitous. Google and to some extent Apple are one trick ponies. Although its a damn good trick, its risky to only know how to make money doing only one thing.

danso 13y ago

> An oft-cited example of this is the reluctance of the Office applications group to release complete versions of Word, Excel and other software for iPads and Android devices. That decision, in theory, could help Microsoft tablets that run Windows, though it hasn’t yet...An even broader conglomerate is Samsung, which is in areas as varied as electronics, life insurance and petrochemicals. But each of those businesses is run with a high degree of independence from the others. The company supplies screens and semiconductors for Apple, even though Apple is the main rival to Samsung’s mobile phone business. The Samsung software layer on their Android phones was so awful, so devoid of inspiration, that even as an Android user, I hoped that Apple would continue to spank them in the phone industry. But I highly respect whosever management decision it was to keep Samsung's units as independent as possible, even so that one hand of the company may be helping to spank the other. Perhaps it's because Apple's business is too good to lose, but hopefully there's some "a rising tide lifts all ships" mentality in there. Meanwhile, Microsoft could've ported Office and given it a good foothold as the productivity software of mobile and the cloud..but by the time they've waited for the Surface to become a success, Google and Apple may both eat its lunch

moca 13y ago

It is tricky to manage any large company. The more tricky problem for Microsoft is that it heavily depends on old business models. A significant portion of Microsoft profit comes from Windows and Office. Other companies, like Google, can offer competitive products almost for free. That could happen eventually. It won't take Google too much efforts to provide a desktop version of Android and Office-like product. Even at several billion dollars R&D cost, it is still much cheaper than Motorola purchase. Microsoft enterprise business is hugely competitive. But other than that, it is hard to achieve meaningful profit margin (xbox may earn couple of billions, internet services always lose money, Nokia probably break even for next few years). So the problem is more about innovate than manage Microsoft.

jpatokal 13y ago
Why would Google develop a desktop Android or Office, when they've already got this? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrome_OS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chrome_OS
- pjmlp 13y ago
  Because it sucks?
  - frozenport 13y ago
    I would like to second this opinion. I have used Google tools to collaborate but always needed to post process the results in a real presentation make program like Office or Latex.
  - Zigurd 13y ago
    At the current state of development, Google has a problem: Android is by far the better general-purpose OS, but Google Drive's office productivity apps suck REALLY bad on Android. If they were implemented to the same standard as Android's GMail app, Windows would have a lot to worry about. But as it is, Android isn't going to displace any enterprise desktops this week.

fauigerzigerk 13y ago

I think things will become much much worse for Microsoft before they get better. I'm afraid they will lose small and medium size enterprises and ISVs because their licensing structure has become so complex, overpriced and antiquated that a new generation of customers will refuse to deal with them. In the past there was piracy as a way to lower the barriers to entry. Today, piracy has become dangerous for small companies in developed countries. All of a sudden SMEs and ISVs are confronted with scores of product feature matrices, weird dependencies and restrictions, kafkaesque partnership programs and long-term committments. Sometimes they are just plain stupid. For instance, I recently came across this page that explains developer account types: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/apps/jj863494.aspx http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/windows/apps/jj863494.aspx It seems harmless if convoluted at first sight. But look at the dependencies they have created. In order to sell Windows desktop apps in the Windows store and use all device capabilities you need a company account, and to get a company account you need to be recognized as a company in your own country. That's effectively a wholesale import of tax, social security and incorporation laws of countless countries into Microsoft's own terms of service. Microsoft operates in many countries so they have to know how onerous this rule can be. They are erecting a huge barrier to entry for individual software developers and early stage startups around the world. I'm sure they will claim it's for their users' safety. But this must be the most uncreative, idiotic safety measure ever invented, particularly if you know how easy it is for real criminals to game this system. Now, I'm not saying that developer relations is Microsoft's most serious problem. Not at all. But it goes to show how incapable this company is of putting themselves into the shoes of those who have to deal with them in any capacity.

bad_user 13y ago
> In order to sell Windows desktop apps in the Windows store and use all device capabilities you need a company account, and to get a company account you need to be recognized as a company in your own country There are valid reasons for doing that. In Europe for example one reason would be VAT handling. It may very well be that they were forced in doing this. But, in European countries at least, you have the option to register as a Sole Proprietorship. Depending on the country of course, this is painless to do, accounting is simpler and taxes are much better (in comparison with starting a LLC and paying yourself a salary). It has downsides of course, but for developers trying to experiment it is perfect.

orionblastar 13y ago

Ever since Ballmer took over, Microsoft is just scoring 'Own Goals'. Microsoft used to think that Apple was their enemy, that IBM was their enemy, that Sun was their enemy, that Oracle was their enemy, that Google was their enemy? Well Microsoft is their own worst enemy! In fact we have entered a Post-PC, Post-Microsoft era. Apple knew it was Post-PC and invested in smartphone and tablets and knew the desktop GUI would not work in mobile devices. So iOS got a different GUI/UI than Mac OSX has. Microsoft does not get that, a Desktop GUI for all products! Hey why'd we lose $900M in Surface sales? Oh well better buy out Nokia who failed to turn profits selling Windows Mobile 8 phones named Lumina, and rebrand them as 'Surface' phone so they will sell better. Microsoft has to fix their broken business model, they tried to steal Apple's model and it backfired on them because they aren't Apple (Duh!) and they don't manage things the same way Apple does. Steve Ballmer is no Steve Jobs or Tim Cook, and he should understand why. Instead of fixing what is wrong with their products and services, they just 'rebrand' them under a different name. Lumina becomes Surface phone, Zune Music Player becomes XBox Music. Windows 8 gets updated to Windows 8.1 and adds the Windows logo where the Start Menu used to be and it takes you to the Start Page in the Metro UI. But where are the visual clues on how to find the Charms Bar? Where are any visual clues at all in the Metro UI? Why is Windows 8.X the first version of Windows not to have visual clues to the user in some form? Of course the desktop part has them, minimize, maximize, close buttons on Windows. But Metro UI does not. If I were Tim Cook I would not worry about Microsoft taking away anything Apple has done. I would just develop a less expensive version of the iPhone and iPad series, perhaps the iPhone Lite or iPad Lite that can compete with Surface phones and tablets in price. Then let customers decide when the iOS versions have the visual clues and a UI that works for mobile devices and Surface does not.

mherdeg 13y ago

Wow, the "Mini-Microsoft" blog is now nearly a decade old! Interesting that it doesn't get called out in the Times article, except implicitly by name in the paragraph at "A list of missed opportunities and disappointing investments at the company in the past decade in areas like smartphones, tablets and Internet search have led to the belief that a more focused, nimble collection of mini-Microsofts could respond more effectively to the never-ending flow of disruptive technologies nibbling at its foundations." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini-Microsoft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini-Microsoft)

netcan 13y ago

One thing that doesn't seem to come through in all these pundit articles and internet discussions is how fantastically successful MS are. They've survived several paradigms over decades in a business where most didn't. Most years (including the last few) they make more money than the year before. They have a bunch of very big businesses that make big money. Compare that to Google. Google do lots of cool things: self driving cars, webmail. glass, android. Cool stuff. Still, almost all their money comes from search/adwords/adsense. They have lots of faults. I really dislike Windows. But, they have a lot of good traits too that others should emulate. A big one is stubborn survivey-ness. Just because an MS thing is still lame 2 years after it was launched doesn't mean it won't make it. They can stick at lame products until they make them decent. Bottom line I guess is that MS are survivors. I expect them to survive.

Zigurd 13y ago

If I were King of Microsoft I would break it into two companies: 1. Take ex-Nokia handsets, XBOX, and all the miscellaneous hardware and consumer software and cloud services and call that Microsoft Devices and Services. 2. Take Windows 8 for PCs and servers, Office, everything enterprise and call it Azure, Inc. Spin the two entities out to shareholders and reap the gains from letting investors own the thing they want to own, and from managers managing the thing they want to manage in the direction they want to go. Azure would end up licensing a good deal of stuff to MD&S, but both entities could end up with a strong licensing business to third parties, too. That would be nice, but I agree with fauigerzigerk: "...things will become much much worse for Microsoft before they get better"