“Google proved to be the final straw that broke Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s back,” Yi-Wyn Yen reports for Fortune.
“After weeks of threatening Yahoo that the software giant would attempt a hostile takeover if the company refused its bid, Ballmer explained Saturday why he decided to withdraw his offer for the Internet portal. He was walking away because of his archrival Google,” Yen reports,
“Yahoo would become ‘undesirable’ if it formed an alliance with Google, Ballmer said in a statement. Last month, Yahoo had outsourced some of its search advertising results to Google in a two-week trial. The Internet portal said it was considering a long-term partnership with Google and that a deal could be announced as early as next week, a source familiar with the matter said,” Yen reports.
Full article here.
Excerpts from a BusinessWeek interview with Apple CEO Steve Jobs, October 12, 2004:
Steve Jobs: Apple had a monopoly on the graphical user interface for almost 10 years. That’s a long time. And how are monopolies lost? Think about it. Some very good product people invent some very good products, and the company achieves a monopoly. But after that, the product people aren’t the ones that drive the company forward anymore. It’s the marketing guys or the ones who expand the business into Latin America or whatever. Because what’s the point of focusing on making the product even better when the only company you can take business from is yourself? So a different group of people start to move up. And who usually ends up running the show? The sales guy… Then one day, the monopoly expires for whatever reason. But by then the best product people have left, or they’re no longer listened to. And so the company goes through this tumultuous time, and it either survives or it doesn’t.
BusinessWeek: Is this common in the industry?
Steve Jobs: Look at Microsoft — who’s running Microsoft?
BusinessWeek: Steve Ballmer.
Steve Jobs: Right, the sales guy. Case closed.
Source: The Seed of Apple’s Innovation
What a crock. Ballmer just got cold feet cause their stock is tanking, their OS sux, and really, what was the point in spending all these billions on Yahoo anyway? Microslop would have just screwed it up and pissed away all that money in the process.
Face it MS, you’re NO Google! You would not know what to do with it if you had it.
I bet MS stock will even tank more come Monday….
Who cares M$ did not buy yahoo for one reason or another end of story for M$ lets see what happens to yahoo if they belly up they go belly up the end
@Jobs’s folly
Jobs is not the sales guy…he is the visionary, the captain of the ship. His talent is finding the right people for the job and giving them whatever it is that they need to do their thing. That my friend is true genius….not bean counting.
P.S. The Flyers suck bigtime…..frikken goons
I think that Sparkplug’s scenario may be closer to the mark, as I read some ideas like this expressed by market analysts. I think that as miserable the track records of most market analysts are, they stand head and shoulders above tech analysts, . . . as we read everyday in these pages.
On the other hand, perhaps Ballmer may be a “true incompetent”, like someone else in the news, and misses the opportunity.
And somehow I have this repeat visual of how it would be if MS went belly up. It would leave one Helluva place to park one’s bicycle.
Where is Zune Tang when we really need him?
I’d love to here his take on Ballmerang.
Yahoo and Microshit are down the tubes.
At least Yahoo might stay somewhat useable for a few days more, or less.
Steve Jobs is also recapping his own story. The Apple board got rid of Steve Jobs, the visionary, and gave the helm to John Scully, the sales guy.
alansky: I was thinking same thing. I wonder if MS will bring Bill Gates back as a CEO. Since they seem to copy everything Apple does.
SJ did get 400k people to buy AppleTVs, I’d say he was one hell of a salesmen
I have no stake in Yahoo: I barely use their site more than a couple of dozen times each year and the only thing they’ve got of any value is the Konfabulator IP that they bought a few years ago.
My personal view is that Yahoo are delaying the inevitable and that is – quite frankly – a good thing. And the reason for that is that the longer Ballmer remains obsessed with search, advertising and Google, the less he’ll focus on operating systems, phones and the fact that he’s going to be blind-sided by Apple working around his flank.
Let Yang and Ballmer dance their little waltz for another twelve to eighteen months: it actually works in Apple and Google’s favour.
@ MCCFR
I agree. While we might say the OS is no longer important, it remains the foundation on which everything else stands. Having a good OS means you will have a good development platform, good applications, a good driver solution, a good web platform and links to a good server platform.
If MS lose substantial share in the OS realm then people will question their reliance on .NET, Office, MS driver support, IE and IIS.
In the consumer market place developers are forced to support a heterogeneous client platform. In the enterprise developers don’t have such restrictions. Once iPhones, Macs & Linux come in the front door enterprise developers will have to support a more open set of development tools, allowing more non-Windows PCs to enter. i.e. if MS continues to lose touch on the OS front, the rest may open up very quickly.
Damn, I was fully prepared to sacrifice Yahoo at the altar of the Dark Gods of Redmond if thats what it would have took to help hasten their demise.
Lastly who wants Ballmer to go anywhere? He is the BEST CEO that Microsoft has ever had, may he continue his “expert leadership”…
“Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester, Uncle Fester” repeat ad-naseum….
Lastly isn’t there a site that has derivatives of the Monkey Boy dance ala Star Wars kid?
Steve Ballmer is the worse thing that ever happened to Microsoft.
What are we talking about?
Mark my words: Within three months, Jerry Yang will be out of a job and Microsoft will own Yahoo! before the year is out, and pay no more than $33 per share.
It’s not truly over until the fat, sweaty guy sings. I still think that Micro$oft will go after the stock holders of Yahoo! That’s what most companies go for when they want to take over a company and the CEO’s don’t want it to happen.
I think that there’s a lot to what Ballmer said in that I wouldn’t want to have anything to do with Yahoo! if it becomes just another MSN.