In a bullish presentation to financial analysts today, Steve Ballmer promised Windows 7 PCs that would 'overturn the conventional wisdom that Apple has the coolest hardware'.
He also described Apple's impact on Microsoft sales this year as 'a rounding error', saying that; "Apple's share globally costs us nothing."
"Hopefully we will take share back from Apple," said Ballmer, "But they sell only about 10 million computers globally so it's a limited opportunity."
Taking a bite out of Apple
Ballmer said that research data showed that Microsoft adverts targetting Apple's prices were working, claiming that three times as many 18-24 year olds now think that Microsoft represents better value than Apple - a reverse of the situation before the commercials ran.
"We don't believe in coming to market like Apple - high margin, high quality, high price. We believe in high volume and low price," Ballmer told the Microsoft Financial Analyst Meeting. "Investors are pushing us to spend more money on this marketing."
Ballmer also released the latest data on Windows 7: 8 million copies of the release candidate have been downloaded; half of IT managers plan to upgrade to Windows 7 'as soon as it's available'; and 80 per cent intend to move within 30 months.
The Microsoft boss revealed a change in pricing strategy for Windows 7 in developing countries: "We did a programme to cut the price of Windows in emerging markets. The theory was that lower prices would lead to higher attach rates and higher revenues. That theory was wrong, so for Windows 7 we'll readjust those prices north."
He also had a few words to say about open source rivals, noting that: "It's hard to build ecosystem momentum with a chaotic operating system like Linux," and gloating over expected delays to Android-based netbooks.
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zhirow
August 4th
4. @bitsink Wow, so how's the Apple flavored kool-aid taste? You think Apple doesnt release updates do you? Well in case your running the Jesus OS that doesn't require patches I present--
Apple security updates
Last Modified: August 03, 2009
Article: HT1222
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222
or the also helpful Mac OS X Updates: Most recent
Downloads 1-20 of 201
http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/apple/macosx_updates/
All OSes need patches or as Apple so cutely calls it:updates and frankly it's noone's fault your using WinXP when the rest of us moved on to Vista. If you have issue with MS then stop using it, your not required to and if you like being locked down then by all means, please go buy an Apple. If you prefer to show your "geek cred" then get Ubuntu, but for the love Al Gore, stop perpetuating Apple marketting as fact. It's sad and frankly disappointing and...
it diminshes you so much.. *sniff-sniff-tear*
@david1225 He's that stupid, actually, Ballmer's over exuberant and doesn't parse his words well. On the matter of why he addresses Apple directly? Because Apple constantly dumps on MS, just like other people who, though they have no programming prowess or ideas ***** about everything thats wrong but produce nothing of their own. There is, after all, a fine line between critique and trolling and most people are trolls. They maybe small but they're still a competitor as is Linux which he mentioned, and whenever ChromeOS comes out he'll mention them as well. That's how these things work.
@mbb I agree.
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bitsink
July 31st
3. If Apple is so unimportant why does he mention it? From my experience Apple products work first time unlike Microsoft which needs to send software patches out every week for as long as I've been running XP.
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david1225
July 31st
2. Ballmer was such a bad choice to run Microsoft. He's really an embarrassment. On the one hand, Apple's too small to matter and, on the other hand, their spending all this money on ads that target Apple? Could he be that stupid, or think that we're that stupid?
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mbb
July 30th
1. I know it Ballmer, but he's still walking a fine line with some of these comments. Any claims about something offering better 'value' are often interchangeable with 'cheaper', but they don't necessarily mean the same thing.
Also "We don't believe in coming to market like Apple - ...high quality..." is pretty will into facepalm territory.
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