Steve Ballmer is back!

[Millionaire]

The guy was brilliant at building a massive, dominant corporation and sucked at running it when it was mature,

not sure why that's so hard to accept?

Why is it so hard to accept?

Because it seems obvious to everyone except you that Bill Gates was responsible for most of the initial success at Microsoft. And after he handed control to Balmer, Balmer was well out of his depth.

 

[Butterfly]

can we all agree that Steve Balmer is a wanker?

 

[newwurldmn]

Why is it so hard to accept?

Because it seems obvious to everyone except you that Bill Gates was responsible for most of the initial success at Microsoft. And after he handed control to Balmer, Balmer was well out of his depth.

Steve ballmer wasn’t good at figuring out the next technology but neither was bill gates or satya nadella. What all three ceos were good at (compared to the rest of the world) was using the company position to maximize Microsoft’s position from new technologies. from the height of the tech bubble to 2014 Steve ballmer doubled Microsoft’s earnings and revenues. Share price stagnated but that’s not as bad when you realize that you are comparing the performance from the dotcom peak valuation.

he wasn’t Microsoft’s best CEO. But he wasn’t an unmitigated failure as you suggest.

 

[newwurldmn]

They are done anyway, just a giant dinosaur waiting to die a low and painful death

your CFA skills are rusty.

Some of the top buyside tech hedge funds think azure is worth a trillion dollars by itself.

 

[Butterfly]

your CFA skills are rusty.

Some of the top buyside tech hedge funds think azure is worth a trillion dollars by itself.

right, it's not like there is competition in that segment and 5 big players years ahead of them

 

[newwurldmn]

right, it's not like there is competition in that segment and 5 big players years ahead of them

only one other: Amazon.

everyone else is an also ran.

 

[Butterfly]

I think you forgot Google Cloud, Oracle, and IBM cloud solutions LOL

3 small unknown companies

 

[Sig]

I think you forgot Google Cloud, Oracle, and IBM cloud solutions LOL

3 small unknown companies

Azure and AWS are in the $60B+ annual revenue range. Oracle isn't expected to top $1B in sales until 2023 (Oracle is a laggard in cloud infrastructure even after TikTok deal (cnbc.com))
IBM's cloud numbers are somewhat closer but it turns out that what they call "cloud" and what the rest of the world does are completely different, so it's not an apples to apples comparison (IBM’s “Cloud” Business (or Lack Thereof) – Platformonomics). Google Cloud is at $13B, so about 20% of Azure and AWS. Maybe not an also ran but not in the same league either.

Turns out that being "known" more generally doesn't necessarily equate to being a big player in a specific field in the business world.