14 DAY TRIAL // There’s no doubt that Steve Ballmer is a true Microsoft man, and every time you listen to him talking about the company, you might be tempted to believe that the software giant is the best firm in the entire world.
This time, Ballmer said in an interview with ZDNet that Microsoft’s only purpose was to create apps that would not only help people be productive, but also to have serious fun on their computers.
The Surface tablet was designed to cope with these requirements, explaining that Microsoft’s migration to devices and services is an effort supposed to help the company continue this approach.
"Are we a productivity company or are we a software company? Well, what we are is a company that knows how to create great software for productivity and serious fun, but the expression will be through services, and through devices increasingly. And maybe it always has been,” he said.
“There's no question Windows defined a class of a device. The problem is in new classes of devices, it's hard to get leverage simply through the OEM model -- whether it's phones or tablets -- and so we're doing more first-party hardware than we used to. But we're trying to express our creativity writing software, particularly software that helps people be productive, communicate, and have serious fun.”
Ballmer however will leave Microsoft in early 2014, as the company is already looking into several candidates, including cloud boss Satya Nadella, who’s seen as the perfect replacement for the existing CEO.
While Microsoft said that it discussed with more than 100 potential candidates for the CEO seat, it turns out that the shortlist comes down to only a few names, including Nadella, Ford’s CEO Alan Mulally, Tony Bates, Kevin Turner, and former Nokia boss who’s now a Microsoftie Stephen Elop.