ballmer

The exit of Microsoft's two top entertainment executives on Tuesday has many wondering just what is going on within Redmond's executive offices.

Although Microsoft reorganizes itself in some way on a nearly annual basis, the departure of both Robbie Bach and J. Allard is clearly a big deal. Bach, 48, had spent two decades at Microsoft and was one of its four divisional presidents, while the 41-year-old Allard was a key visionary behind the Xbox game console and other Microsoft consumer efforts.

The move comes at a critical time for Microsoft, which this year has on tap the … Read more

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer sent an e-mail to Microsoft workers on Tuesday reassuring them that the company is well-positioned in the consumer arena even as it is shaking up its executive ranks there.

The company announced Tuesday that Entertainment and Devices unit President Robbie Bach as well as another top executive, J. Allard, are both leaving the company. Bach will retire this fall, while Allard is shifting to be an adviser to Ballmer on certain, unspecified projects.

"Transitions are always hard," Ballmer wrote in an e-mail. "Robbie has been an instrumental part of so many key moments … Read more

With a high-power crowd in the audience, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer went hard-core with his sales pitch on the role cloud computing will have for businesses in the coming years.

Speaking to about 125 chief executives and other leaders, Ballmer said that truly big shifts in technology actually don't happen all that often.

"The really big ones you have to totally jump on," Ballmer said during a speech at the company's annual CEO Summit, which runs through Thursday at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Wash. "We are, right now, all of us in the midst of … Read more

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is giving a sneak peek at the next version of Microsoft's instant messaging program.

The new Windows Live Messenger will add a number of features, including tabbed conversations, the ability to do video chats in HD quality, share Web sites, search results and other content types, as well as pulling in updates from other social networks.

"The new Messenger will provide a great way to have more meaningful conversations with the people you care about most while also bringing together your social networks and sharing updates, cutting through the clutter, and staying up to … Read more

As the United States continues to struggle with its deficit, a task force created by President Obama to address the situation may be turning to Microsoft to inform the public about the difficulties of balancing a federal budget.

According to USA Today, Erskine Bowles, head of the Obama administration's budget-balancing task force, has contacted Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to see whether the company could build a video game designed to allow gamers "to take a stab at balancing the budget."

Details on the title are few and far between. Although it sounds like it will be Web-based, … Read more

Revealing a bit of previously hush-hush history that's relevant today, Sun Microsystems' former chief executive says that Apple CEO Steve Jobs threatened to sue Sun for infringing on its intellectual property in 2003 for a user interface design.

And that's not all: Microsoft's Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer also tried to get Sun to license Microsoft Office patents for use in OpenOffice, a move that would have made open-source distribution of the competing product impossible, Jonathan Schwartz said in a blog post Tuesday.

The anecdotes will be of interest at handset maker HTC, which Apple sued last week for patent infringement. … Read more

SANTA CLARA, Calif.--Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer maintains a secret Twitter account for providing running commentary on high-school basketball matches: but that doesn't mean he wants to buy the company.

Ballmer's booming voice filled the Santa Clara Convention Center on Tuesday morning at SMX West, where he was interviewed on stage by Search Engine Land's Danny Sullivan on a wide range of topics related to Microsoft, Bing, and the company's struggling yet strategically important Internet business. Having wrapped up its search deal with Yahoo and restructured a separate search and advertising deal with Facebook, it wouldn'… Read more

I thought this Steve Ballmer autograph on a Macbook Pro was fake, but according to the following video of the big man scribbling it on a student's computer at Trevecca Nazarene University in Nashville, it's not. Somewhere in a dark place, Jon Ive is bracing himself and sobbing. With a British accent.

This story originally appeared on Gizmodo.

A Deloitte research note claims that tablet computers will finally capture the affection of consumers this year.

"Tens of millions of people" will buy a tablet computer--or a "NetTab," as dubbed by Deloitte--in 2010, the company predicted Monday.

"NetTabs are expected to meet specific consumer needs" that aren't being met by either smartphones or by laptops, the company said. Deloitte reasons that smartphones are "still a bit small for watching videos or even Web browsing," while notebooks, Netbooks, and ultra-thin PCs are still "too big, heavy, or expensive."

Deloitte … Read more