The Beast of Redmond is Roaring (& Thinking) Again
Last week Microsoft seemed to wake up from a long hibernation and announced:
* No, we are not ceding the browser game to Firefox
* Hey, we are cool again
* No, we won’t let Amazon AWS be the de facto choice for start-up hosting
Maybe Sergey Brin was right to be unnerved.
Tactically, this PR blitz looks like a stick to wave at Yahoo management and shareholders. I would be a tad unnerved to be negotiating with this guy!
The Microsoft vs Google slugfest is one of the better spectator sports around. It is like Sumo wrestling, but then some smaller guys like Yahoo, AOL, Amazon, Ask occasionally jump in the ring saying “hey, look at me, I am big too”. Whack. Oops, the big sumo boys did not mean to hurt you. As with any good match, we have passionate supporters on both sides and lots of really heavy betting action.
What’s been missing recently is the big moves by Microsoft. Bill Gates was pretty deliberate about his succession. First he hands over the biz stuff to Ballmer; squeeze every last drop out of that cash cow please. Then he brought in Ray Ozzie, his cerebral equal and somebody the developers can relate to.
With no big moves, I wondered if Ozzie was being shackled by the Innovators Dilemma and could not move fast enough to meet the emerging battle for the big cloud services.
However these latest moves indicate that Microsoft is thinking and not just roaring. There were also some quiet 'below the radar' deals last week, that were pretty significant if you look at where they could go. Acquiring Credentica is a big move in the online ID game and that is a big game that still needs leadership.
So I decided to research what Microsoft has acquired recently. Somebody has already done the hard work and put it onto Wikipedia. I don’t know if it is accurate; if you see any big gaps, you can go edit the Wikipedia entry (as well as commenting here of course). The number of acquisitions tells a story of a pretty hungry beast:
2000 - 7
2001 - 4
2002 - 4
2003 - 4
2004 - 4
2005 - 14 (including Groove, which brought in Ray Ozzie)
2006 - 19
2007 - 15
2008 - 5 (up to Feb 27th, does not have Credentica)
Many of these deals are quite small by Microsoft standards. They are buying R&D. It clearly takes them a long time to take cool R&D and scale it to the level that is needed to be meaningful for Microsoft. That is good news for start-ups looking to exit. When the big guys need every ounce of competitive advantage for their fights, small guys can benefit.
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Awesome post, Bernard!
I am still feeling like they are not able to execute quickly enough. Google and Apple seem much more Agile.
Execution problem is due to complexity and intertwining of the product stack. In that world, productizing R&D, especially acquired one is particularly hard, because you can't just release it you need to "fit" it and in the process of fitting it changes from the original so much that it becomes unusable.
Alex
Kinda off-topic...
This reminds me of part Dune in which Baron Vladimir Harkonen appointed his vicious nephew Rabban to squeeze Dune for spice and at the same time prepared his other nephew, the bright Feyd-Rautha, to his place as next baron of the house.
So I'm on stage at Mix'08 to be "interviewed", when out pops the iTard of the ages: Guy How's-ya-Saki, comes trotting out!
Ohhhhh! I hate this guy Guy! In the old days he used to clean our clocks and deride Windows to the Nth degree! ...And now he's up here on a stage with ME? (Somebody is gonna' get fired when this is over!)
How's-ya-Saki, came out swinging! But I gave as good as I got or better!
How's-ya-Saki: Mr. Ballmer, it's goooood to be wit 'cha today!
Ballmer: I wish I could say the same guy. (crowd laughs - I scored first)
How's-ya-Saki: Well, let's get right to it! How about that Google? (he's trying to get me angry)
Ballmer: We're in the game, and we're the little engine that could, just working away, working away, working away! In online, yeah, it's Google, Google, Google. I'd say we're the underdog. (the crowd aplauds)
How's-ya-Saki: What about Web Developers sir?
Ballmer: You want some love right here, right now? You want me to stand up and do that on the MIX stage?" (I screamed loudly, standing to cheers and pumping his fists) "You want to hear Web developers, Web developers, Web developers!" (I got a standing ovation then)
How's-ya-Saki: Well, (squirming in chair) Vista's a dog and yah don't got Yahoo! What 'cha gonna' dooooo? (the crowd boos)
Ballmer: (motioning for the crowd to calm down) If Vista's a dog, then it's a cross between a Great-Dane and a Timber Wolf! (applause) ... and the Yahoo thing is like being Bill Clinton on a date: one way or another, you are gonna have your way with 'em! (crowds laughs)
This was going really well! Seeing How's-ya-saki's MacBook HotAir on the coffee table (not a surface) between us, I grabbed it and fell to the floor like it was so heavy it dragged me down.
Ballmer: That thing is heavier than the Toshiba I use! It's missing half the features I need. Where's the DVD drive? I'll have a bake-off with my 'Tosh' and that thing backstage. (the crowd was laughing hysterically!)
Ballmer: I'll bet this thing can fly like a frisbee!
How's-ya-Saki: (lunging towards me, but tackled by my BlackWater guy) NOOOOOOOOO!
I then slung that thing just like a Frisbee out over the audience!
DANG! It's aerodynamic! It zipped a good 500' before hitting the rear concrete wall and exploding!
Upon seeing this the crowd was frenzied and started chanting: "BALLMAH! BALLMAH! BALLMAH! BALLMAH! ...."
I looked down at Guy What's-his-Saki, he was in a fetal position sobbing uncontrollablly, so I said to him: "Interview's over guy!"
I then jogged off the stage doing mi Ali air-punches!
NOW THAT WAS A CONVENTION!
btw: When giving an interview, It always helps to make sure that 90% of the audience works for you.
How will these recent moves by Microsoft make my work faster, easier and 'funner?'
To me, much of this sounds like 'lipstick on a pig,' the pig being the portion of Microsoft that won't fully commit to the Software as a Service model as they continue to squeeze every dollar they can out of their Application Service Provider products - along with those behemoth client installed applications that fill our hard drives and compel us to purchase or RAM.
To me, the purchase of various companies and/or even MSFT's most recent venture away from the desk space into the web space are mostly a cosmetic application of ruge to keep shareholders and "won't get fired for hiring MicroSoft" CIOs from jumping ship.
All the while, I'm unclear how a small to mid-size organization will benefit from all this 'roaring thought' that I'm not going to enjoy from employing Zoho, Google Aps, and other products enumerated in this past ReadWrite article:
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/web_office_suite_comparison.php
Watch the virtualization space too! After Calista, Microsoft acquited Kidaro yesterday (not in Wikipedia yet)
http://virtualization.com/acquisitions-acquisition-takeover/2008/03/12/microsoft-acquires-desktop-virtualization-software-maker-kidaro/