Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer has been interviewed by the Financial Times, with an amusing opening: "So, you finally got rid of that other guy."
Ballmer's main point is that Microsoft doesn't have much share of the online ad business and that this makes it a good prospect for growth -- hence the attempt to buy Yahoo.
FT: The Yahoo bid was taken partly as a tacit admission that you needed to do something fairly radical. Was that a fair response? . MR BALLMER: No, it's inaccurate. It may be fair; I can't comment as to fair. In a sense online is our best deal, isn't it? We're small; the other guys are big. There's a market out there. We have only one way to go, and it's up, baby, up, up, up, up, up!
Well, he would say that, wouldn't he. But technology markets generally follow power laws and Google is steadily increasing its market share, just as Windows did. So, more likely, the only way is down....
However, as usual, Ballmer makes a virtue of Microsoft's persistence, which is something few firms have even if, like Microsoft, they're rich enough to be able to afford it:
FT: Is that he core attribute of this company, persistence? . MR BALLMER: I think our long term - I'd call it our long term approach, which is a combination of taking on bold challenges, being patient, being persistent, being relentless. There's an accountability and in some senses you've got to be relentlessly accountable and you also have to be willing to stick with things. We don't pull back; it's not what we do. . Sometimes we get shareholders who will question us on that, but I think it's our great strength. It's what built Windows, it's what build [sic] Office, it's what built our enterprise business, and what's going to let us build the search business. It's what [sic] letting us build a TV business.
It's easy to mock Ballmer, of course, but he's doubled Microsoft's sales from $25bn (2001) to $51bn (2007) and annual profits from $7.3bn to $14.1bn, even after legal and Xbox-related charges. Revenues could reach $60bn this year -- none of which has been reflected in Microsoft's share price. Perhaps with any other CEO, that's the kind of thing that might have been of more interest to the Financial Times....
