Palantir Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 It was more likely that they realized that ValueAct would try to stir trouble by getting other activists involved. VA only had 2%, but if other guys start hounding them and pushing for a board seat, then it would be a huge distraction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest valueInv Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Having "timeline moved up" is not the same as getting fired. Because you conveniently ignored part of the statement, " first by him and then the nine-member board". The implication is that Ballmer was already planning on retiring, but the board decided that it was best if he retired sooner, that's not "firing", that's "mutual consent". And that's assuming the sources are even true. You walk into work tomorrow. Your boss calls you in, gives you a piercing look at tells you, "I think it will be best if you resign immediately." I'm sure you'll walk out happy thinking you quit. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 That's not remotely close to what happened, but why present evidence and logical analysis when you can make snide comments on every topic? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest valueInv Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 That's not remotely close to what happened, but why present evidence and logical analysis when you can make snide comments on every topic? I'm ready to present logic and evidence when you are. Btw, the only person who presented anything related to evidence so far is me. But feel free to post evidence showing that he was not fired . Anytime now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 What you posted didn't suggest he was fired. It merely said he was planning to leave, but the BoD moved up his time for departure. It could be due to many reasons, but given that there was an activist investor looking for a seat on the board, it's the most likely reason. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rpadebet Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 That's not remotely close to what happened, but why present evidence and logical analysis when you can make snide comments on every topic? I'm ready to present logic and evidence when you are. Btw, the only person who presented anything related to evidence so far is me. But feel free to post evidence showing that he was not fired . Anytime now. I think I agree with others on the board that this sort of bickering doesn't add value to the conversation. I am trying to understand why you think it matters too much to the valuation of this 275 bill company whether the CEO was "fired" or whether he voluntarily agreed to "retire". Are you suggesting he got "fired" because of some terrible skeleton in the closet he was hiding? If so what do you think it is? How much discount is it worth? The short comings of this firm are painfully obvious to all (whether you are a shareholder or not). The ability of this firm to produce tremendous cash flows on the other hand through their established legacy businesses is also obvious to the few who bother to look through their reports. The real question is whether they get consumed by their short comings or are they going to engineer a turnaround by leveraging their high cash flows? Right now if you have any solid reason to believe either of the two scenarios is more likely, please present it to the rest of us here and that would be a true value add. In my opinion, if you want to engineer a turnaround, you want a new leader with a new vision. Not that the old leader was bad. He had his time and his opportunity to do so. It didn't pan out, so it should be someone else's turn now. Also the old CEO is going to be there for another year, so the transition shouldn't be difficult. He has also not indicated he is selling all his shares in the company, so clearly he believes his money is safe. If there were some terrible news to come out, which only he knew, I think we would have seen him cash out to some extent at least by now by publicly declaring he was fired and that's why he is cashing out. He had the ruse if we wanted to do so. He didn't and that indicates something contrary to what you are suggesting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
writser Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Agreed, in my opinion the question whether Ballmer was fired or left voluntarily is completely irrelevant. Truth is probably somewhere inbetween. Please discuss it in private. As value investors, let's stick to the price v.s. value discussion. Present situation; Windows is still running on (ballpark) 90% of all desktop computers. Microsoft software is being used by every company on this planet. Largest shareholder is one of the smartest businessmen of the century. Balance sheet is rock solid. Produces stellar amounts of free cash flow. Margins suggest a huge moat. Hated by the general public. Some ventures (mobile, bing, entertainment) might have some upside. Stockprice appears cheap by several metrics. Count me in; I'll try to ignore the noise and see what happens in a couple of years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ajc Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Hmmm... Let me see what happened here: I said Ballmer was fired. Texual asked how do you know. I posted an article from WSJ saying that they talked to insiders and the board asked him to leave. Textual calls it FUD and launches an attack. Riiiigghhht, I'm the problem. ;) But if you want to improve the quality of threads,how about answering at simple question with your financial analysis: why does it seem to cost Amazon more to sell a dollar of inventory when Walmart can do it for less with much less technology. After all, since, you posted pages on Amazons operations, you'll have no problem answering the question that actually matters to investors. Thanks, but I've said all I want to on this. Anyone who is utterly sad and masochistic is more than welcome to read the last 20 or so of your comments as well as mine (Amazon included) and the handful of others who've criticized your approach if they want, and decide for themselves whether the assertions about your know-it-all-ism are unfairly harsh or not. My own view is that they too will find you intelligent, but also somewhat lacking in the humility, giving-credit-to-others and generally-being-civil-and-not-snarky departments and that is all that any of us have been trying to indicate really. None of us to my knowledge have anything against you or think you stupid, we simply don't appreciate being treated like a bunch of ignorants who deserve nothing but your scorn and high-handedness. Anyway, I'm bouncing. Hope you eventually take this all in the constructive way it's meant because you're clearly no fool, but at the same time I'm hitting the sidelines for a while so I don't get too caught up in this (sometimes tangled and distortive) interwebby-thing. Peace. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Present situation; Windows is still running on (ballpark) 90% of all desktop computers. Microsoft software is being used by every company on this planet. Largest shareholder is one of the smartest businessmen of the century. Balance sheet is rock solid. Produces stellar amounts of free cash flow. Margins suggest a huge moat. Hated by the general public. Some ventures (mobile, bing, entertainment) might have some upside. Stockprice appears cheap by several metrics. Who cares? We want to talk about Social Media, Google Glass, and how M$ is irrelevant! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest longinvestor Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Present situation; Windows is still running on (ballpark) 90% of all desktop computers. Microsoft software is being used by every company on this planet. Largest shareholder is one of the smartest businessmen of the century. Balance sheet is rock solid. Produces stellar amounts of free cash flow. Margins suggest a huge moat. Hated by the general public. Some ventures (mobile, bing, entertainment) might have some upside. Stockprice appears cheap by several metrics. Don't know about that. I've seen a segment of the intelligentia, many in the IT industry hating MSFT. For as long as I can remember (20+ years?). Margins and the implied moat suggest something else. Count me in the Google haters club. I feel "sold" to advertisers each time I do anything on any Google product. It happens 100's of times daily. It's very simple, they work for the other guy, not me. I'm truly getting off searching on Google. Would rather pay for upgrades(MSFT or anyone else) than get sold. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 Microsoft hate used to be mroe of a 90s thing, these days Microsoft hate is more like "hey look at the old rich uncle at a One Direction concert". In either case, MS is not a sexy stock. To most people. I believe that is what writser is saying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LC Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 Didn't someone mention that when your customers hate your product SO MUCH, yet STILL USE IT, there is something quite powerful there... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rpadebet Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 Didn't someone mention that when your customers hate your product SO MUCH, yet STILL USE IT, there is something quite powerful there... Haha ! Who said a moat is something only around a castle to protect against competitors getting in. It could be around a prison to stop customers from getting out :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest wellmont Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 it's elop by a nose. http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57600465-71/new-microsoft-ceo-elops-tip-top-bookies-say-sandberg-long-shot/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fareastwarriors Posted August 30, 2013 Share Posted August 30, 2013 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-08-30/microsoft-signs-pact-to-cooperate-with-activist-valueact.html Microsoft Signs Pact to Cooperate With Activist ValueAct Microsoft said today the agreement involves holding regular meetings with ValueAct Capital president Mason Morfit and “selected Microsoft directors and management to discuss a range of significant business issues.” The company said ValueAct has the option of having Morfit become a director beginning at the first quarterly board meeting after the 2013 annual shareholders meeting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 A good piece and a strong rebuttal to short termists who are only interested in the cash they can extract out of this business. Microsoft’s Next CEO Will Not Spin Off Xbox, Unless They Abdicate The Company’s Larger Strategic Direction http://techcrunch.com/2013/08/30/microsofts-next-ceo-will-not-spin-off-xbox-unless-they-abdicate-the-companys-larger-strategic-direction/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest ajc Posted September 1, 2013 Share Posted September 1, 2013 Interesting article from Fortune discussing former IBM chief Sam Palmisano as a candidate for the Microsoft top job - http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/08/27/the-microsoft-ceo-candidate-no-one-is-discussing-sam-palmisano/ (there's a fair amount of wishful thinking in it, but overall it raises some worthwhile points). On the subject of finding new tech CEO's, I'm actually reading Lou Gerstner's book on the IBM recovery at the moment and one thing that struck me was that he obviously had no tech experience when he joined (yet he clearly ended up doing a marvelous job turning around the company once he got over his reservations). The IBM search committee consisted of two people (both friend's of Buffett's), Tom Murphy of Cap Cities/ABC and Jim Burke of J&J and they both concluded that a tech background was advantageous, but in no way an absolute necessity, so that turned out to be in large part why they eventually ended up going for the ex-McKinsey, American Express and RJR Nabisco guy and not an industry insider. Of course, that's not to say Gates and his committee will end up doing the same sort of thing, but Gates is on the Berkshire board with Murphy so it's not too much of a stretch to imagine that he has possibly got both his and Buffett's opinions on the matter as well as the whole IBM search backstory (which is pretty much all part of the public record anyway) and that this has therefore entered his personal considerations. Anyway, Gates and the Microsoft committee will clearly make their own decision but I'd be extremely surprised if they ended up refusing point blank to consider anyone from outside of the technology sector for the CEO job simply because various media pundits happen to expect that'll be the case. My best guess (not that it's worth a whole lot), is that they'll try to keep a very open mind on things and look for the best business leader that suits the position regardless of whether he's currently working in the industry or not. Just my opinion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 ^I'm not aiming this comment at you personally, but against this notion many have been voicing. I don't believe Microsoft's situation is comparable to IBM's pre-turnaround, and it is a little lazy to expect them to mimic IBM's plan. Microsoft is not a sick company, they are facing headwinds, but have been working to solve that the past few years, and it will take time for them to pivot. I don't buy into the concept of an outsider as a CEO, because I don't believe it needs an outsider CEO, and I have not seen evidence as to why they should hire one. The suggestion for Palmisano depends too much on "changing MS's culture" when it's not obvious that such a radical change is needed. Furthermore, very few people outside this firm have experience working in such a giant corporation and in the same product space. MSFT is a firm that's famous for it's fiefdoms and infighting, and Ballmer worked towards ending that in his last reorganization. Whoever becomes the next CEO in my opinion must be a strong product person, likely an engineer, who can command respect among the firm's developers, has a strong strategic sense, and has relevant experience in MS's core products. I think Mr Palmisano fails on multiple accounts, and he's not a young man either. I think the most qualified people to run MSFT are Paul Maritz, Satya Nadella, and Tony Bates. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
krazeenyc Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 WOW Microsoft Buys Nokia's handset business and hijacks their CEO for the sum of $7.2 billion. Maybe Stephen Elop really was a corporate spy. Microsoft has been spending that overseas cash - $8.5B Skype, $7.2B for Nokia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fareastwarriors Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 Microsoft to Buy Nokia’s Devices for 5.44 Billion Euros http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-03/microsoft-to-buy-nokia-s-devices-business-for-5-44-billion-euros.html Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) will buy Nokia Oyj (NOK1V)’s handset business for 5.44 billion euros ($7.2 billion) as the Finnish company exits a business it once dominated and the maker of Windows moves into hardware to boost growth. The deal includes paying 3.79 billion euros for the devices unit and 1.65 billion euros for patents, the companies said in a statement today. Nokia Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop will step aside to return to Microsoft. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Viking Posted September 3, 2013 Author Share Posted September 3, 2013 MSFT makes three separate announcements all within a month... restructuring, Ballmer retiring and now Nokia aquisition. These sorts of things will take YEARS to successfully integrate. MSFT is starting to look a little desperate; perhaps they are having their mobile holy jesus moment. The Finnish people must be ready to lynch Elop: he kills their phone business then sells it to MSFT at a fire sale price and then rejoins MSFT (his former employer). Finns are very proud, loyal and passionate; this turn of events must be killing them. Being European, the Nokia brand has strength in Europe. Now that the phone business is actually owned by the 'evil' Microsoft I wonder if this will actually hurt sales over time. The Elop, Nokia, MSFT story would make a great movie... had it not happened in real life it would have been dismissed as fiction and not possible in todays 'rational' business world. MSFT's other 'partners' must be scratching their heads. MSFT has a habit of striking very one sided deals with its partners; we now have another great example. Interesting to see how MSFT does with reorg, new CEO and now new handset business. Fortunately, they have a pile of cash to use to try and get some traction in mobile. $8.5 billion for Skype and now $7.1 billion for Nokia; starting to add up to some real money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Myth465 Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 Microsoft has a history of pissing away money via acquisition. I think this is more of the same. Wonder if they will buy BB and join # 3 and 4. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest wellmont Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 elop was the best thing that could have happened to $nok at the time. he brought a rational outside perspective. he saved them from being totally destroyed by bad local management. by the time he had arrived, nok stock had gone from $40 to $10. company was in free fall with an extremely poor position in smart phones. elop made a deal and the stock rose 40%. msft made a deal and the stock went down 5%. elop sold a money losing device business. msft bought it. he left nok, now profitable, with billions of dollars to reinvest and or distribute to shareholders. elop is the winner here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Palantir Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 I totally called this. Looks like this makes Elop the front runner for the top job, Mr VP of "Devices and Services". If so, disappointing, I'd hoped for either Nadella, Bates, or Maritz. I feel ValueAct would also favor Nadella or Maritz. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest valueInv Posted September 3, 2013 Share Posted September 3, 2013 I totally called this. Looks like this makes Elop the front runner for the top job, Mr VP of "Devices and Services". If so, disappointing, I'd hoped for either Nadella, Bates, or Maritz. I feel ValueAct would also favor Nadella or Maritz. So did you buy Nokia? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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