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Ballmer steps down from Microsoft board to focus on basketball, teaching
He was Microsoft's 30th employee, its first business manager and CEO for over a decade. Now, after 34 years with the company, Steve Ballmer is leaving Microsoft behind. In a letter to Satya Nadella, Microsoft's new CEO, Ballmer explained that he's leaving the company's board of directors effective immediately. "I have become very busy," he explains. "I see a combination of Clippers, civic contribution, teaching and study taking up a lot of time." It's not a surprising development -- owning an NBA franchise is a pretty big responsibility, after all -- but it marks the end of Ballmer's decades-long influence over the company. Despite his departure, the former-CEO is still invested in the company's success, and spent most of the letter encouraging Nadella and giving advice.
Microsoft cuts 18,000 jobs as part of its largest layoff ever
Microsoft today announced that it's cutting 18,000 jobs, the biggest round of layoffs in its history, as part of ongoing restructuring efforts. In a release, the company says that Nokia's Devices and Services business, which it acquired for $5 billion last year, will be most affected, with 12,500 "professional and factory positions" expected to go by the end of the year. In an email to employees, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella explains that the company's new strategy is designed to make it "more agile" moving forward, allowing teams to work more freely.
Watch Satya Nadella's first major appearance as Microsoft CEO live
Rumor has it, Microsoft is getting ready to take the wraps off of Office for iPad. Despite that move potentially signaling a shift away from a Windows-first software strategy, the iOS app won't be the only star of the show. It's going to have to share the limelight with yet another, largely untested asset: CEO Satya Nadella. Given his track record at the company and recent statements, we expect to hear plenty about mobile, the cloud and Microsoft as a devices and services company. Chances are, he won't come out sweating and screaming like his predecessor, but if you're curious to see how Nadella stacks up or, you know, have a thing for Redmond's productivity suite, you can watch it all play out here or at the source link below. And get ready for even more of Nadella and the Microsoft crew when they hit the mean streets of San Francisco for the Build developer conference next week. Watch Satya Nadella Live @ 1PM ET
Microsoft is announcing an 'intersection of cloud and mobile computing' later this month
How does Satya Nadella run a Microsoft press event? We're about to find out: the company's new CEO will is coming to San Francisco later this month to talk about "news focused on the intersection of cloud and mobile computing." The topic certainly plays to his strengths. Before taking the helm as the company's new chief executive, Nadella played a major role in launching Office 365, Microsoft's subscription and cloud-based Office platform. While that application is already accessible from mobile devices, native Android and iOS Office apps have reportedly been on Microsoft's roadmap for some time too, and we wouldn't be surprised if they surfaced at this event. Microsoft won't speak further on the specifics of the event, but we won't have to wait long -- Nadella takes the stage on March 27th.
Meet Satya Nadella, the man tasked with reinventing Microsoft
Steve Ballmer couldn't change Microsoft fast enough. During his 13-year stint as CEO, the company failed to get in front of major technological developments. It struggled to keep pace with the likes of Apple and Google in mobile and search and saw lackluster adoption of its first round of tablets. Ballmer created a sluggish corporate culture that pitted employees against each other, and he wasn't moving fast enough to right his wrongs. It was time for him to move on. On August 23rd, 2013, the 34-year Microsoft veteran announced that he would retire within the year. The company's board set out on a highly publicized five-month journey to find its next leader. Ballmer's Harvard classmate and Microsoft co-founder, Bill Gates, would join the committee to find a replacement who could follow through on its mission to become a devices and services business in an increasingly fast-paced industry. Over the next five months, the board of directors, led by John Thompson, would narrow its pool of more than 100 candidates to just a few. As time wore on, speculation escalated and outsiders like former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop and Ford CEO Alan Mulally emerged as frontrunners in the glacial race. Meanwhile, rumors pegged internal candidates like former Skype CEO Tony Bates and EVP of Cloud and Enterprise Satya Nadella as possible contenders. All of that speculation came to an end today when the board appointed Nadella as the third CEO in the company's near 40-year history. Like Ballmer before him, Nadella is a company man, with more than two decades at Microsoft. He understands how the Microsoft of old works and has managed to lead its cloud and enterprise services to great success, but questions remain about his ability to lead the company into the future.
