Will Microsoft fire Steve Ballmer?
Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft has had a roller coaster of a career at the company. After Bill Gates handed over the reins of his mighty empire to Ballmer, things have been slowly going down hill. Will 2010 be the year Ballmer gets fired by Microsoft?
Newsweek recently published an interesting list of top ten 2010 tech predictions. One of the predictions is that Microsoft will finally push out Steve Ballmer from the CEO position.
The reasons given for this prediction revolve around many of the incidents that have occurred over the past ten years at Microsoft. Windows Vista was Microsoft’s biggest failures in the company’s history. Also, Microsoft stock has plummeted by about 50 percent coming in under the Dow Jones average.
Other reasons given were the fact Ballmer missed many of the tech booms of the past decade such as the Internet search, mp3 players, online music explosions. Also, Ballmer failed to jump on the mobile and netbook operating system train. The fact that Ballmer failed to successfully handle the attempted Yahoo acquisition also has put the onus on him.
Its really is difficult to say if Ballmer is a victim of circumstances or of his incompetence. Ballmer may have been given the seat during the onset of Microsoft’s turbulent times. After all I hardly suspect that Ballmer or anyone else could have combated Apple’s brilliant iPod/iPhone wave. Also, the evolution of operating systems may be coming to a crawl with consumers rethinking their needs.
Its all really difficult to say who is at fault here, but many will probably hold Ballmer accountable. It will be interesting to see if Microsoft and its investors will take actions in 2010 or let things continue to ride out. However, taking action may be more difficult than said with Ballmer, being Bill Gates’s golden boy and college buddy and all.
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December 21st, 2009
If Microsoft didn’t get rid of Emballmer during the Vista debacle, then they are not going to get rid of him now. Unless of course he is secretly working for some Linux development team…lol
December 21st, 2009
Ralph, you don’t know sh*t. Vista wasn’t Ballmer’s fault and if you take a look at what went on back then, you can easily see which high-level VP’s took the fall for Vista even before it shipped…
October 22nd, 2010
like him or hate him its obvious that Steve ballmer is not normal and Bill gates handed him the business has doomed Microsoft and techies are saying he is crap at the job what do you expect if you have someone who is mentally handicapped because his brain can’t handle business stuff I think sacking him will be a bad decision because he has a right to employment