Steve Ballmer

Addressing an audience at the 2011 Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC 2011) Monday Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, acknowledged that their Windows Phone 7 platform was a failure.

Ballmer was lauding the company success in other sectors saying that Windows 7 sold 400 million licenses in just two years while Office 2010 sold over 100 million licenses over the same period.

However, talking about Windows Phone 7, Ballmer noted that Microsoft simply hasn't gained any traction:

An influential hedge fund manager David Einhorn raised a question of dismissing Steve Ballmer from the position of a CEO of Microsoft. The response of Microsoft Corp's board was that it supports Ballmer and has no plans to replace him.

"His continued presence is the biggest overhang on Microsoft's stock," Einhorn told fellow fund managers at the annual Ira Sohn investment Research Conference in New York.

Microsoft's nine-person board, including Chairman and co-founder Bill Gates, supports Ballmer, a source close to the board told.

According to the latest statement of Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft the next version of their operating system – Windows 8 will become available in 2012.  

A new Windows Phone update is to come soon, as promised by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, who also said that new partner Nokia would supply "absolutely phenomenal" handsets.

While the market has a skeptical attitude towards the new alliance, Ballmer believes that the scale that Nokia would bring to an already improved Microsoft mobile platform will be good news for operators, developers and consumers.

China was pressed by US President Barack Obama and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to strengthen their policies directed to implement intellectual property rights across the country. Ballmer met with Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao on Wednesday at the White House to address the issue.

"So we were just in a meeting with business leaders, and Steve Ballmer of Microsoft pointed out that their estimate is that only one customer in every 10 of their products is actually paying for it in China," Obama told a news conference in Washington.

According to the report made by the New York Times this week, CEO of Microsoft Steve Ballmer is expected to make an announcement of new slate devices next month at the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Windows 8 operating system will come in 2012 according to a blog posting on Microsoft’s Dutch website. The posting was quickly removed but not until a bunch of online bloggers had managed to screenshot it. Ina Fried at CNet, particular, has posted the pictures.

In the Dutch post that mentioned the celebration of the first Windows 7 birthday the company said that Microsoft was hard at work on Windows 8 but the release was about two years away.

Steve Ballmer announced that by the Christmas holidays customers will see a Microsoft slate device that will rival Apple iPad tablet. The Redmond head did not elaborate on whether the palm-sized slates would actually be on sale in time for Christmas, nor did he say who would make them.

"You'll see new slates with Windows on them. You'll see them this Christmas," he told an audience of students, staff and journalists at the London School of Economics.

Oh, Microsoft, you are still trying to show the signs of being alive, while in fact you do not realize that you are one foot in the grave because of the balmeristic policy practiced by your management team.

Well, on Thursday the Redmond company made its every effort to persuade concerned and frustrated investors and shareholders in that it is still viable and able to compete with the industry leaders like Jobsian conglomerate Apple.

Today almost everyone knows Bill Gates and his direct relation to the wide used Windows operating system and other products of Microsoft. While the times when Gates took direct part in the processes of Microsoft’s production have passed many people still believe he is the face of the Redmond company. However, according to an independent analysis and investigation of Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, ITworld, the state of affairs is much far from what we may think.