Ballmer intends to remain on Microsoft board after end of CEO gig

Wall St won't like this...

There goes the uptick when he announced his retirement.

The next Blackberry

After watching Blackberry's descent into oblivion you'd think these guys would take a hint.

"But he has sat on the board since way back in 1981"

It's the only way to make the b*ggers do what you want !

Is he going to be Chairman of the board?

A board position would be reasonable. You need someone there to explain why management has done what they have done. Bill G. should move to a director role also and the CEO and Chairman roles should be some new blood that can provide a new perspective in the world of computing. Microsoft is sitting at a crossroads exactly where IBM (the previous Olympian gods of computing) was when they brought in Gerstner. They need to be able to redirect their focus from the past to whatever will bring them into the 21st century.

Ditching Gates would be a daft idea anyway, his plans obviously work well otherwise they wouldn't be so bloody rich. Ballmer's mentallity is amusing but keeping him on the board might atleast prevent his strategy being completely disregarded. Too much change will kill the company.

yes to elop!

he is exactly the right man for the job - just look at his success not just a nokia, but also, macromedia and mmm boston chicken (weird they don't exist any more huh)

My blessings for Ballmer on the board

i hope they keep ballmer on the board so he and buddy Gates can continue screwing up the company. they deserve it after arm-twisting and killing off companies over all these years.

Get rid off the dead wood

Microsoft has made one terrible decision after another these last ten years or so. Vista, borking their cash cow Office, Win 7 only a half-good product bringing nothing of consequence to the table that wasn't already there in XP - in reality, the main reason for the success of Windows 7 was that it wasn't Vista -and then the monumental stuff up that was Windows 8. meanwhile, the company continues to loes bucket loads of money on blind, brute-force-stupid attempts to break into things it has never been any good at, such as search and telephones and tablets.

The first step to getting better is to admit you have a disease. Never in the history of computing has a company so desperately needed new, competent management. Hell, forget "competent", *any* sort of new management will do, 'coz even Bling Freddie could do better than Balmer's crew.

Just bring in someone new and get rid of the failures, OK?

Fuck Uncle Fester. I thought we were rid of that asshole.

can't let go

I fully appreciate that once they took the company public they ran the risk of being outed.. However, like gates and Ballmer or not, they built that company and in their eyes it's still theirs and no VC is going to tell them what to do or when to leave. In my opinion it is time for them both to go but I also understand their reluctance.

If I were an investor in any company which was successful (and MS is, regardless of what random voices on the Internet say) and a long standing CEO was about to leave his job, I certainly wouldn't be wanting him to leave the company, I also would want to be booting out the Chairman who also founded the business. There needs to be continuance in order to ensure that the new people coming in actually understand the business and the historical reasons for decisions made. Hell, even RBS kept Fred Goodwin on after the government forced his sacking, in order that Stephen Hester could hit the ground running.

RIP Microsoft

Keep the deadweight, and you will be dead.