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Ballmer’s New Strategy ‘One Microsoft’ to focus on Devices and Services

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Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer sent a letter , under the title “One Microsoft”, to employees on Tuesday and followed up with a conference call together with CFO Amy Hood later that week on Thursday afternoon. Ballmer characterized the new strategy as a “shift in our business to being a devices and services company,” which he specified started “over a year ago. “The form and delivery of our value will shift to devices and services versus packaged software,” Ballmer reiterated.

Adapting to a new Environment

Microsoft is embarking in this new holistic strategy in the midst of plummeting PC sales and strong demand for mobile devices produced by competitors Samsung, Apple and Google.

One Strategy, One Microsoft

In the letter Balmer says that “we are rallying behind a single strategy as one company — not a collection of divisional strategies. Although we will deliver multiple devices and services to execute and monetize the strategy, the single core strategy will drive us to set shared goals for

Steve Ballmer
Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft

everything we do. We will see our product line holistically, not as a set of islands. We will allocate resources and build devices and services that provide compelling, integrated experiences across the many screens in our lives, with maximum return to shareholders. All parts of the company will share and contribute to the success of core offerings, like Windows, Windows Phone, Xbox, Surface, Office 365 and our EA offer, Bing, Skype, Dynamics, Azure and our servers. All parts of the company will contribute to activating high-value experiences for our customers.”

Ballmer added that Microsoft will “reshape how it interacts with our customers, developers and key innovation partners, delivering a more coherent message and family of product offerings. The evangelism and business development team will drive partners across our integrated strategy and its execution. Our marketing, advertising and all our customer interaction will be designed to reflect one company with integrated approaches to our consumer and business marketplaces. This means we will organize the company by function: Engineering (including supply chain and datacenters), Marketing, Business Development and Evangelism, Advanced Strategy and Research, Finance, HR, Legal, and COO (including field, support, commercial operations and IT). Each discipline will help drive our overall strategy. Each discipline will also be charged with improving our core capabilities in its area. We must improve in all aspects of the business.

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