鮑爾默下臺,微軟甩掉160億美元天價大包袱
????時至今日,我們很難對史蒂夫?鮑爾默無動于衷。一方面是因為他終于決定放棄對微軟公司(Microsoft)的掌控,在擔(dān)任微軟CEO的13年里,鮑爾默的種種舉措令投資者們感到失望;另一方面,投資者的失望最終量化成了一個具體的數(shù)字,雖然這個數(shù)字可能有些武斷。事實證明,鮑爾默這么多年來一直是微軟肩上一個價值高達160億美元的大包袱。 ????周五上午,微軟宣布鮑爾默退休的消息后不久,公司股票便暴漲約3美元,當(dāng)日收盤價比前一日的32.39美元上漲了2美元,漲幅約為6%——當(dāng)天標(biāo)準(zhǔn)普爾500指數(shù)僅有小幅上漲。微軟公司已發(fā)行股票為83億股,這對投資者意味著超過160億美元的漲幅。(值得注意的是,倍感失落的鮑爾默所得到的安慰獎可不容小視:鮑爾默名下有3.33億股微軟股票,這意味著當(dāng)天他便凈賺大約6.66億美元。) ????這些并不令人感到意外。多年以來,投資者們一直對鮑爾默心懷不滿,而且一直以來要求他讓位的呼聲也越來越高。但有兩個因素使鮑爾默得以繼續(xù)執(zhí)掌微軟。一個原因是微軟聯(lián)合創(chuàng)始人兼董事長、最大股東比爾?蓋茨一直力挺鮑爾默。其次,微軟公司并還沒有明確的接班人。 ????鮑爾默將在一年內(nèi)離職,據(jù)公司方面稱,這完全是鮑爾默自己的決定。鮑爾默在新聞發(fā)布會上說:“這種類型的轉(zhuǎn)型永遠不會有一個完美的時間節(jié)點,現(xiàn)在就是最佳時機?!彼硎?,這家軟件業(yè)巨頭正在努力向“設(shè)備與服務(wù)”公司轉(zhuǎn)型,他希望在轉(zhuǎn)型的過程中退休。不過他說:“我們需要一位能夠長期執(zhí)行新策略的CEO。” ????微軟公司成立了一個由四人組成的特別委員會,尋找鮑爾默的繼任者。作為委員會成員之一的蓋茨說:“我們很幸運,史蒂夫?qū)允貚徫灰恢钡叫吕^任者上任?!?/p> ????不過,雖然蓋茨和微軟董事會有足夠的時間來考慮微軟在后鮑爾默時代的發(fā)展,但這家公司依然沒有明確的繼承人。今年早些時候,鮑爾默剛剛完成對公司的一次重大重組,很大程度上是希望結(jié)束公司內(nèi)部各自為政的局面,或者正如鮑爾默自己所說:“將一盤散沙的微軟變成同一個微軟”。此次重組產(chǎn)生了幾位有潛力的內(nèi)部候選人——如負責(zé)設(shè)備與工作室部門的Windows系統(tǒng)元老朱莉?拉森-格林,原Skype負責(zé)人、現(xiàn)在負責(zé)業(yè)務(wù)開發(fā)的托尼?貝茨,以及云與企業(yè)工程部負責(zé)人薩蒂亞?納德拉——要想?yún)⑴c公司最高職務(wù)的角逐,他們之間或許先要一決雌雄。 ????目前還看不出微軟外部誰有能力接受微軟的挑戰(zhàn)。正如梅格?惠特曼在惠普(HP)所面臨的困境一樣,這家行業(yè)巨頭已經(jīng)錯過了向移動計算領(lǐng)域進行結(jié)構(gòu)性轉(zhuǎn)變的最佳時機,如今想要將其帶入正軌并非易事。微軟一直在努力追趕蘋果(Apple)和谷歌(Google)等公司,但結(jié)果并不盡如人意。就在上個月,微軟因其Surface RT損失了9億美元。這款設(shè)備最初的目的是與iPad進行競爭,結(jié)果卻未能如愿。 ????微軟還有時間嗎?兩年前,《財富》雜志(Fortune)曾發(fā)表過一篇文章,詳細描寫了投資者對鮑爾默時代的種種失望,其中就曾提出過這個問題。雖然微軟在企業(yè)銷售方面依然強勁,也有Xbox等熱門消費者產(chǎn)品,但投資者的失望卻越來越多,如今提出這個問題,顯然更加尖銳。(財富中文網(wǎng)) ????譯者:劉進龍/汪皓??? |
????It's hard not to feel a little bit bad for Steve Ballmer today. Not because he's finally giving up the reins at Microsoft, where his 13-year tenure as CEO has been a string of disappointments for investors, but because there's finally a figure -- arbitrary as it may be -- to measure that disappointment. Ballmer, as it turns out, has been a $16 billion drag on Microsoft. ????Shortly after Microsoft (MSFT) announced his retirement Friday morning, shares surged by nearly $3, before settling at about $2 higher than the previous close of $32.39, a roughly 6% gain -- on a day when the S&P 500 (SPX) index is barely up. With 8.3 billion shares outstanding, that represents a surge of more than $16 billion for investors. (Mind you, the consolation prize for a bruised ego is nothing to sneeze at: Ballmer, with some 333 million Microsoft shares to his name, will net about $666 million for the day.) ????None of this comes as a surprise. Investors have been unhappy with Ballmer for years and have agitated for his removal with growing frequency. Two things stood in the way. Bill Gates, the Microsoft co-founder, chairman, and largest shareholder, stood by him. And there was no obvious successor. ????Ballmer's departure, which will become effective in the next 12 months, was voluntary, according to Microsoft. "There is never a perfect time for this type of transition, but now is the right time," Ballmer said in a press release. The software giant, he said, is attempting to transform itself into a "devices and services" company, and he had hoped to retire when Microsoft would be further along in that transformation. But, he said: "We need a CEO who will be here longer term for this new direction." ????Gates, who is part of the four-member committee that will search for a replacement, said: "We're fortunate to have Steve in his role until the new CEO assumes these duties." ????But while Gates and Microsoft's board have had ample time to think about a post-Ballmer world, there is still no obvious successor. Earlier this year, Ballmer engineered a major reorganizationdesigned in part to end the company's warring fiefdoms, or as Ballmer himself put it, "to move from multiple Microsofts to one Microsoft." The reorg left a handful of potential internal candidates -- among them, Julie Larson-Green, a Windows veteran who heads devices and studio, Tony Bates, the former Skype head who is in charge of business development, and Satya Nadella, who heads cloud and enterprise -- who may have to duke it out among themselves for a shot at the top job. ????On the outside, it's not clear who has the chops to take on the challenge. As Meg Whitman's ongoing struggles at HP (HPQ) show, righting the course of an industry giant that largely missed the tectonic shift to mobile computing will not be easy. Microsoft has been trying to play catch-up to the likes of Apple (AAPL) and Google (GOOG) for some time, but it has little to show for it. Just last month, the company took a $900 million charge on its Surface RT, a device designed to compete with the iPad that failed to deliver. ????Is it too late for Microsoft? Fortune asked that question more than two years ago in a story that detailed the disappointments of the Ballmer era. While Microsoft remains strong in enterprise sales and has a hit consumer product in the Xbox, the list of disappointments has only grown longer, and the question is more poignant than ever. |