Libor Kubín For the past 14 days, Microsoft has been making headlines. The first event was the announcement of Steve Ballmer's departure from the management of the company, the second act is the purchase of Nokia.
In the early 80s, Apple and Microsoft became the symbol of a new era, pioneers in the introduction of personal computers into everyday life. However, each of the mentioned companies chose a somewhat different approach. Apple chose a more expensive, closed system with its own hardware, which it produced itself in the beginning. You could never mistake a Mac computer thanks to its original design. Microsoft, on the other hand, made virtually only cheaper software for the masses that could be run on any piece of hardware. The result of the fight is known. Windows has become the dominant operating system in the computer market.
I love this company
Po the announcement of the resignation of the head of Microsoft began to speculate that the company will have to reorganize and that Apple should be the model in this effort. It will be divided into several divisions, competing with each other... Unfortunately, even if the company starts to put these measures into practice, it cannot copy the functioning and structure of Apple. Microsoft's corporate culture and a certain (captive) way of thinking will not change overnight. Key decisions are coming too slowly, the company is still benefiting from the past. Inertia will keep the Redmond juggernaut moving forward for a few more years, but all the latest (desperate) efforts on the hardware front show that Microsoft has been caught with its pants down. Although Ballmer has ensured long-term growth and revenue for the company, he still lacks a long-term vision for the future. While they were resting on their laurels at Microsoft, the bandwagon of competition began to disappear into the distance.
Kin One, Kin Two, Nokia Three…
In 2010, Microsoft tried to launch its own two phone models, the Kin One and Kin Two, but failed. Devices intended for the Facebook generation were withdrawn from sale in 48 days, and the company sunk $240 million in this project. The Cupertino company also burned down several times with its products (QuickTake, Mac Cube...), which customers did not accept as theirs, but the consequences were not as fatal as with competitors.
The reason for the purchase of Nokia is said to be Microsoft's desire to create its own interconnected ecosystem (similar to Apple), speed up innovation and more control over the production of the phones themselves. So to be able to make phones do I buy a whole factory for that? How do the guys from Cupertino solve a similar problem? They design and optimize their own processor, create their own iPhone design. They buy components in bulk and outsource production to their business partners.
Managerial flop
Stephen Elop has worked at Microsoft since 2008. He has been a director of Nokia since 2010. On September 3, 2013, it was announced that Microsoft to buy Nokia's mobile phone division. After the merger is completed, Elop is expected to become an executive vice president at Microsoft. There is speculation that he could win the seat after the outgoing Steve Ballmer. Doesn't that help Microsoft out of the imaginary puddle under the gutter?
Before Elop came to Nokia, the company was not doing so well, and that is why the so-called Microsoft diet was implemented. Part of the property was sold off, Symbian and MeGoo operating systems were cut, replaced by Windows Phone.
Let the numbers do the talking. In 2011, 11 employees were laid off, 000 of them will go under the Microsoft wing. From 32 to 000, the value of the stock decreased by 2010%, the market value of the company went from 2013 billion dollars to only 85 billion for Microsoft to pay for it the amount of 56 billion. The share in the mobile market fell from 15% to 7,2%, in smartphones it went from the original 23,4% to 14,8%.
I dare not cast a crystal ball and say that Microsoft's current actions will lead to its final and inevitable demise. The consequences of all current decisions will be apparent only in a few years.
"the market price of the company went from 56 billion dollars to only 15 billion, so that Microsoft paid the sum of 7,2 billion for it." But MS did not buy the entire Nokia company - only the mobile division...
But that doesn't change the fact that Elop practically destroyed Nokia.
That's just a point of view. He, too, Elop could work hard and secure a sale with some profit. Without him, Nokia might not even exist. So watch out for all-knowing wisdom and deep conclusions from them, when it boils from water.
Hi Jakub.
Yes, he could work hard. But the results don't quite match that. In my opinion, it was a fatal decision to cut a completely new operating system and deploy a completely different one. If you were the head of a foreign company like this, significantly reducing its value to a fraction of the original price, would the owners let you work like this for three years? I'm afraid not.
Me, see you. The fact is that the funds that Mrkvošrot will spend on the development of new devices are 4 times higher than the apple company. And the result? Phew. Everyone will judge for themselves. I had a PC for 16 years, a MAC for 8 years. I work on both platforms min. 8 hours per day. I have to say that I wouldn't go back to the PC, even if they stretched me. So much experience :)
You write that you work on both platforms, but you wouldn't go back to PC. So how is it actually??
Some (like me) are forced to work on Windows at work :)
I personally also work on win os at work and have had a mac with osx for over a year. but as far as work is concerned, I still haven't decided to transfer the corporate environment to osx. I see more glitches there, and the first one is that Microsoft Office packages released for OSX are practically unusable for me. Excel slowed down, no access.
I'm not saying it can't be done, but it takes a lot more time to "reprogram" the osx platform. After years of living on winOS, it's just not that simple. it definitely takes time.
Well, we'll see what Apple comes up with now, but it hasn't come up with anything in the last year. So I'm curious about the new and new cheap iPhone and the smaller and more powerful iPad 5. However, it's still floundering in place (the performance of the iPad 2 is still enough) even if the competition (Samsung) has its pasquiloid Androids unfinished (Android on 70 %, MS at 50%, Apple at 90%) so he starts inventing new interesting things that make sense. As soon as he manages to make a meaningful ecosystem and cut off the meaningless Android, then they are a risk to them.
I've already heard it from several people "apple hasn't shown anything in a year" ... sorry, but wanting something new/different every year seems naive and stupid to me, new and original things take time, and if it's not as expected, it's necessary to rework the whole thing ( that's how Apple has always done it, look at the intervals at which Apple introduced the iPod, iPhone, iPad, and a lot of innovations in between) ... and how it turns out when you rush to the market with a product recently demonstrated by Samsung with its watch
No one claims that it is necessary to have something new every year. The point is that when there is nothing then, it is difficult to assess where the company is going ;-).
Microsoft is a very strong company and to expect its immediate or distant destruction is quite optimistic. In general, it is good if Apple has competitors in the market, they force it to push for innovation more. Samsung, fine, but it's not a counterweight to Apple, they only compete in three market segments.
Such strong companies certainly have more projects that end in "fiasco" for the public and financial loss. Whoever concludes that a colossus with a turnover in the trillions of crowns is in danger after losing 250m dollars, is wrong. Many unsuccessful projects will not even be leaked to the public, and the total financial loss will certainly be much greater. Development and research simply cost something. But friends, even a project that we end customers perceive as a "failure" is just another experience for the R&D department of these companies for future projects.
Ballmer is not a visionary like Jobs or Gates, he is simply a businessman and manager. But that's not Ellop either, so I personally rather expect Microsoft to expect further strengthening in the corporate sphere, where it is already a dominant player, and further weakening in the residential sphere, because it is the corporate sphere that does not like to innovate often - frequent innovation = higher investment in IT . Well, we will see :-)
Peter, I say nothing about destruction:
I dare not cast a crystal ball and say that Microsoft's current actions will lead to its final and inevitable demise. The consequences of all current decisions will be apparent only in a few years.
Fiascos are caused by the fact that Microsoft sleeps for a while and then tries to catch up with the competition thanks to its finances. This is not one product to write off, this is the whole range. Tablet PC, Zuno player, music sales, Bing search engine, Kin phones, cloud, Surface RT tablet (Microsoft wrote off $900 million for this project)… Shall I go on?
...that is, I personally rather expect that Microsoft expects further strengthening in the corporate sphere...
Again, some numbers: Apple in the business sphere soared in sales from 2% to 26% in less than six years.
oh god.. i understand i'm on apple site but try to find out some details about microsoft before you write an article like this….
and the structure was published and planned in a completely different framework than apple has.
I love these empty screams. That you didn't understand what the author wanted to say? So that's probably your problem. And I didn't find any actual deficiency.
Regarding Nokia and all of Apple and Android.. everywhere, I find a lot of imperfections that annoy me.. Regarding Nokia, I don't understand why there are strategies that harm the company, why doesn't Nokia also make phones with Android? It could dig out like sony, but we won't push Windows Phone even if we didn't have enough money to make a living... It's true that Apple is pushing into the corporate sphere, but also, if they weren't walled off, they could easily sell ntb with a dokina and could have 70 % more customers in the corporate sphere.
Why can't I make phone calls from the iPad? with a hands free set? My phone crashed and I couldn't even connect.. I couldn't send sms.. I just have some limitations.
One has known Microsoft for many years, but for me personally it is still the same boring company with zero culture and zero ability to move forward and not always get away with the same team. In recent years, they have made so many mistakes, even a small start-up company, which would cost everything, it is the only luck of Microsoft that the incredibly flawed product called Windows is so widespread. Their effort is nice, but they show their only ability again, they want to buy success, it's probably difficult ;)