Steve Ballmer talks 'three screens and a cloud' and more with TechCrunch
By Donald Melanson 
posted Sep 25th 2009 11:57AM
posted Sep 25th 2009 11:57AM
Steve Ballmer's talk at Microsoft's Venture Capital Summit yesterday may have only been open to a select few, but non-VCs can now get the next best thing courtesy of TechCruch, which got a chance to sit down with Ballmer following the event. In the wide-ranging interview, Ballmer discusses Microsoft's new "three screens and a cloud" strategy, which he describes as a "fundamental shift in the computing paradigm" (and can't help but compare to Three Men and a Baby), as well as Microsoft's "fun year" with things like Bing, Windows 7, and Project Natal, and Microsoft's future acquisition strategy (it'll probably buy about another 15 companies next year). Of particular note, Ballmer also went some way to dampen any talk of a Microsoft-banded phone, saying that while an Apple or RIM can "do just fine," Microsoft still thinks a software play is right for them in such a high volume market -- noting that, "when 1.3 billion phones a year are all smart, the software that's gonna be most popular in those phones is gonna be software that's sold by somebody who doesn't make their own phone." Head on past the break to see the whole thing for yourself.
"when 1.3 billion phones a year are all smart, the software that's gonna be most popular in those phones is gonna be software that's sold by somebody who doesn't make their own phone."
Hello? Android?
Seriously, especially when their next gen mobile OS has taken years to launch. I hope Android gains as much market share as possible and outpaces WM7 by the time it launches, if it ever does launch.
I definitely see the 'big two' platforms duking it out over majority market share of smartphone operating systems in the next few years will be Android and Windows Mobile. There won't be a clear winner, but there will be good, old-fashioned competition.
Here's the long-winded reasoning, obsservation and gut-feelings.
Honestly though, I don't see Google attacking the traditional WM user base directly. I'd expect Android to try to push into everywhere else that WM specifically isn't, supplying a richer standardized software platform into the lower-end 'feature' category and then into those niche areas like high-end mobile gaming. Google should, and I expect, will bring some software to the table that targets the 'productivity' WM users and the ultra-geeks, but I just don't see them breaking the traditional office/IT types away from a mobile OS (7.x) that looks and functions similarly to their 8-5 desktop OS (Win 7/Server08). MS would offer some competition into both low-end areas and very high-end, but I wouldn't expect an extreme amount of effort there either because as long as the MS name is in those categories and they are otherwise still synonymous with mainstream smartphones, they're going to be happy. I do see MS pulling the more technical-minded converts back from Apple with 6.5 and 7 however. But, around the same time, the iPhone will begin showing up on other carriers and will probably end up with equilibrium regardless.
RIM has virtually no innovation, either in software or hardware and I can't wait for them to go away permanently. Their business model for the only original innovation they had, e-mail on a cell phone, is crude, outdated, redundant and expensive. The OS is a chore and has been from the beginning. The only thing keeping BB afloat are overly-sweet enterprise business contracts and early smartphone adopters. Innovate or GTFO.
Apple will never stop making its own exclusive devices and marketing itself as the elite, because if they tried to move to open hardware/software to lower consumer costs and target 'the masses,' Microsoft would eat them alive. Apple doesn't have the resources or market share to support functionality across an open computing platform. However, they are profitable and happy exactly where they are, marketing music, largely frivolous apps and claiming a 'moral high-ground over the proletariat.'
Its better than their two screens one cloud strategy.