Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
Summary: Could and should Bill Gates return to day-to-day responsibilities at Microsoft? Fortune is reporting there's a rumor to that effect.
Fortune reported on December 8 that there's talk Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates might be mulling a comeback, largely to help boost Microsoft's stagnant stock price and employee morale.
I have to say I am very, very, very skeptical on this one.
First, it seems this is a single-sourced report. Fortune says: "One prominent chief executive told Fortune he'd heard from someone close to Gates that he might be considering such a move." There are no other sources cited in their story.
Gates has his hands full running the Gates Foundation right now. It's obvious he is thoroughly engaged in what he's doing. Gates denied, as recently as July 2011, that he planned to make a return to the company he started and from which he resigned his day-to-day duties back in 2008.
Sure, some current and former Softies long for the days when projects and technologies were allowed to percolate seemingly endlessly without having to become money makers. They preferred the Gates culture where geeks had more power than suits.
Gates supposedly still plays an active role as a part-timer at Microsoft. But returning as CEO and/or Chief Software Architect (a role vacated by Ray Ozzie earlier this year and subsequently abolished)? I just don't see it -- though I still do think Microsoft could use someone equipped to strategize across all of its business divisions and silos.
A couple of my Twitter chums chimed in with their opinions that Microsoft is more in need of new blood and fresh eyes than the return of its largest shareholder and chairman as CEO. I have to say I agree.
What's your take? Could and should Gates return as Microsoft's white knight?
(Thanks to News.com's Jay Greene for the pointer to the Fortune piece on Gates.)
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Talkback
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
However, as a fantasy I could see this: Bill Gates returns in an interim role while he puts into place new leadership and reforms - that way his Microsoft shares can continue to help fund his foundation into the future instead of being destroyed by Ballmer.
The only issue facing MS ...
... is its stagnant stock price. But that is something that affects the entire PC industry. Also I don't see how people can say MS has no vision, when elements of the company's three screens (the PC, TV, and smartphone) and a cloud vision, keep rolling out. By the way, does anyone know Apple's vision? Does the fact that Apple doesn't spell it out means that it has none? MS is dominating gaming in the console market, and taking over the living room, and this means nothing? Nokia Lumia Windows Phones are flying off the shelves in Europe, and this means nothing? MS' profits keep going up, and this means nothing? MS dominates the business market, in a way no company dominates the consumer market, and this means nothing?
The only issue I have with Ballmer, is that he doesn't seem to be doing anything to address the company's ongoing image problem, which I believe, is the reason for the company's poor stock performance over the past decade. Also I don't see how it is reasonable to replace a CEO with such a great track record, over this single issue. You must also remember, Ballmer took MS through some very dark times, during and after the antitrust saga, when all the world was against MS; and Ballmer kept the profit engines turning. People need to be patient with MS. All indications are that it is on the right track. Still, I really wish Ballmer would address the company's image problem: just acquire / create a group of media outlets to put out the word about MS.
[b]Update:[/b] changed "MS is dominating gaming in the PC market" to "MS is dominating gaming in the console market".
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
Couldn't have said it any better.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
When you have 10x the amount of R&D to spend than your competitors over the last decade then sure you're going to come up with some products, but their competitors have come out with so much more with much less. For PCs they have had a monopoly for two decades, not something you can credit Ballmer with. For the TV, they are competing successfully with Sony (who themselves haven't done much innovation in a decade) for the video game market. I know they've added some other capabilities to their console, but as long as it's part of a game console it's going to be a very niche market. As for phones, they had more share a decade ago. Unless, you're going to give him credit for losing market share, I don't see how you give him credit for that.
The stock price is a very good indicator of a company's performance because investors don't care about your image; they care about how competitive you are and your performance.
Lack of vision
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
Actually...
...I think Mr. Ballmer has exacerbated MS' image problems by treating it as a public relations issue instead of as a substantive policy issue. Too many of us see MS as continuing its efforts to retain and exploit its dominance of the system software market (more carefully than 10 years ago, but the efforts continue). As long as that remains the case, MS won't be turning any enemies into friends no matter how good the software is.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
The Xbox will be passed in World Wide sales in 2012 by the PS3, even though it had a full year start on the PS3/Wii. PC gaming market?? WTF is that anymore. Sure there are PC gamers but PC game sales are a joke, especially among the top money making games, like MW3, BF3 etc.
Nokia Lumina might be selling well, but NOTHING compared to the iPhone or major Android phones. Did you know you can't plug a Windows Phone into a Xbox 360 via the USB port and stream media to the Xbox? Guess what you can plug a iPod, iPhone or even iPad into a Xbox 360 and stream media off of that. Is Microsofts 3 screen's vision, the PC, TV and iOS products????
When will Microsoft have ARM based Windows tablets? Fall of 2012?? For consumers it will be DOA. Probably do "OK" to pretty good in the Enterprise sector...which is a smaller market share.
While Microsoft does do well in the Enterprise sector, that sector is smaller than the consumer sector. Apple and IBM both have a larger market cap than Microsoft.....sad turn of events. Microsoft profits keep going up, but less than both Apple and IBM.
Balmer has done well...but his time has come.
anono, you are incorrect
You act as though you could run a company the size of Microsoft easilly.
Please enlighten us to their competitors that have come out with so much more with much less.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
+1.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
"We don't know what the hell is going on in the industry!!! JUST TRY STUFF! Try everything and see what happens!"
this is a short story i read a long time ago (but couldn't recall
the original story nor the author to credit). the story goes like this...
a young journalist on his first assignment were given the task of
interviewing a successfull businessman to find out his recipe for success.
the young chap ask the question to this effect "sir, what is the secret
of your success?" the businessman replied "i jump at opportunities."
the young journalist further ask "how do you know when to jump at these opportunities?" the businessman replied "that is why i keep on jumping."
r&d is just a waste of tons of money with no end in sight. yet all
successful companies spend 6 to 10% of their gross income because they know that nobody is going to hand them the next big thing. they have to search it themselves. m$, ibm, (but not hp at the moment, i guess) are shooting all over the place and hope that they might hit something or something sticks. microsoft may be misguided as seen outside, but who knows what is going on inside. they have xbox and kinect to show some of their success, they might have some aces under their sleeves!!!
IMAGINE.
Simply imagine, for the very first time in the life of Microsoft they bragged in an ad on television commercials, at some reasonable length, and only truthfully about everything they have really done to put the world where they are today in the world of computing and high tech.
Imagine if Microsoft ran a seres of absolutely factual commercials displaying EVERYTHING they have done in a positive way for the world, perhaps even some minor mention about the fact that Bill Gates has given away almost as much money as Steve Jobs was ever personally worth.
Imagine if for one bloody time Microsoft stopped just trying to promote the next version of Windows as an ad campaign and actually let the entire world know in a series of well done entertaining ads exactly everything Microsoft has done for the world, how they have actually dwarfed anything in any way Apple has ever done for the world, unless you value how many songs you can put on an mp3 player more then creating employment and efficiency for hundreds of millions around the world.
It doesn't matter a tiny whit whatever any number of ABM'ers say about Microsoft, if Microsoft would just make efforts to honestly and seriously toot their own horn in a very outspoken and serious way for a change it might wake a tired part of the world that iPads and iPods are nothing but dust compared to what Bill Gates and Microsoft have done for the world.
Its a real shame that Jobs knew how to stand in front of a crowd with an iPhone in his hand and make himself and the product sound like the second coming while Gates, Balmer and MS in general never could seem to do it near as well or at all, and the fact of the matter is that compared to what Microsoft has done for the world Steve Jobs and all his iMachines are more like second place then the second coming when compared to what Microsoft and Bill Gates have done for the world. Its already available as fact, unfortunately it now seems the truth will either only come out or be accepted broadly in years yet to come when historians decide to look at who did what from a factual point of view.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
"The business market is also loosing faith in MS. It's because they are seeing that MS platforms lock and tie you into them only. With the growth of iOS, OS X, Android, and Linux companies are seeing that being an all MS shop is strangling their bottom line. And they cannot innovate and become better with expensive and hard to manage Microsoft solutions."
The business market isn't losing faith in MS. iOS and Android aren't very relevant in the business product market. Most business users are still using laptops, and MS still dominates the desktop OS market. As LOB application development platforms go, there are two players: Oracle and MS. There just aren't that many shops using PHP for LOB or enterprise applications. As far as DBMS's go there is Oracle, IBM and Microsoft. As far as Server OS's go, there is Linux and Windows Server 200x. Microsoft dominates the productivity software market and the Email server market. When it comes down to cost Oracle and Microsoft solutions are neck-in-neck, although I do think MS is a little cheaper.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
Thank you for saying so eloquently what many are thinking.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
"The business market isn't losing faith in MS. iOS and Android aren't very relevant in the business product market. "
Funny, everyone is tripping over themselves to get an iOS or Android app for their Business apps. And getting their web apps to work on these devices. Companies are piloting and using them for business. They are very relevant.
"Most business users are still using laptops, and MS still dominates the desktop OS market. "
And that marketshare is declining.... Slowly but declining.
"As far as Server OS's go, there is Linux and Windows Server 200x."
Except that IBM and HP still sell plenty of AIX, zOS, AS/400, HP/UX boxes. Even Oracle still sells a fair amount of Sun boxes.
"Microsoft dominates the productivity software market and the Email server market."
Except that Email/Groupware is split about 50/50 Exchange and Notes in the corporate market. Exchange is a POS and really doesn't scale well beyond SMB. Without lots of servers and costs.
" When it comes down to cost Oracle and Microsoft solutions are neck-in-neck, although I do think MS is a little cheaper."
Not when you factor the care and feeding Windows requires. And the lower reliability when compared to Linux or big iron.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
I think another reason for the stagnant stock price is that The Market (tm) rewards growth, and Microsoft probably can't get much bigger than they are now without running a risk of losing focus on their core stuff. Incidentally, this also renders pointless most discussions of Ballmer's overall acumen as a CEO; Microsoft's situation on the desktop and in the office seems virtually unassailable, so even a chimp could run the company fairly well (no offense to Ballmer or chimps intended). I would argue that they haven't really had any calamitous blunders (arguably, ME and Vista could be considered by some to be mis-steps to various extents*), but even if they were to suffer such a blunder, it would probably take at least a decade to experience any significant decline in market share.
With that in mind, I do agree that a big problem with Microsoft is that they can't seem to make it clear to people what they're capable of (look at stuff like the ribbon, which was supposedly a means of bringing certain features front-and-center**, and the recent statement by Craig Mundie about Siri vs. TellMe). However, image isn't something you can buy. Marketing Microsoft at this point is almost like marketing air; it's virtually ubiquitous.
*I actually didn't mind Vista too much, and it could be argued that the foul-ups with some software were largely companies sticking to old practices, but perception of the situation can alter the situation itself at times.
**To clarify, the arguable purpose of the ribbon was that people were asking for this and that feature, but the features were already there; they were just buried beneath menus and dialog boxes. The ribbon seems to serve the purpose of bringing things closer to the forefront.
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
But MS in the living room? Not sure about that, my son recently purchased a Kinect, but until he buy's more interesting games, I prefer the Wii for now.....
Thanks,
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?
"Funny, everyone is tripping over themselves to get an iOS or Android app for their Business apps. And getting their web apps to work on these devices. Companies are piloting and using them for business. They are very relevant."
Consumer apps sure. Business apps, not so much. Maybe there are some fringe projects for these kind of things, most people are sitting in their cube looking at a monitor.
"And that marketshare is declining.... Slowly but declining."
MS's business desktop marketshare is flat. It's a mature market. No one else is gobbling up MS marketshare on the desktop in the enterprise.
"Except that IBM and HP still sell plenty of AIX, zOS, AS/400, HP/UX boxes. Even Oracle still sells a fair amount of Sun boxes."
So what? Oracle pushes exadata running on Oracle Linux. Nobody is developing new Cobol/RPG apps. Everything but Windows and Linux is in support mode.
Exchange is a POS? What and Notes isn't?!?! Gimme a break.
"Not when you factor the care and feeding Windows requires. And the lower reliability when compared to Linux or big iron. "
Pure FUD. Windows Server 2008 properly configured doesn't require any more maintenance than Linux. I'm relatively agnostic about using either, but I can tell from previous posts you have what seems to me to be a neurotic dislike for MS. Grain of salt, I always say...
RE: Bill Gates to return as Microsoft's white knight?