Bidding war: Hansen, Ballmer increase bid for NBA team to $625M

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The effort to bring the NBA back to Seattle isn’t over quite yet. Hoping to convince NBA owners that Seattle is ready for a professional basketball franchise, the Seattle investment group led by Chris Hansen and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer increased its bid for the team by $75 million to a grand total of $625… Read More…

Dropbox is ‘a fine little startup’ and other gems from Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer

Steve Ballmer at a past Microsoft shareholder meeting. (Microsoft photo)

Steve Ballmer has made a habit of publicly downplaying competitors right before they eat Microsoft’s lunch. His comments about the iPhone in 2007 will be cited in business school case studies for years to come. Did he just do it again with Dropbox? The Microsoft CEO was speaking to Bloomberg Businessweek about the release of the… Read More…

Video: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer crashes CES keynote

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For the first time in many years, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer didn’t deliver the preshow keynote address at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last night — but that didn’t stop him from making a appearance. Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs, who took Ballmer’s place in the traditional slot, was about 15 minutes into the… Read More…

Poll: Is Windows chief’s exit good or bad for Microsoft?

Steven Sinofsky

Microsoft Windows president Steven Sinofsky’s surprise departure from the company yesterday is generating all sorts of speculation, including a theory that he left after making an unsuccessful case to be designated Steve Ballmer’s successor as Microsoft’s chief executive. Sinofsky is a polarizing figure, with fans and critics, and the reaction to his departure is having… Read More…

Ballmer makes it official: Microsoft is a ‘devices and services’ company

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Microsoft became one of the largest technology companies in the world by focusing almost exclusively on software, but the company has increasingly shown a willingness to make its own hardware. In his annual letter to shareholders, made public today, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer makes it official, declaring that the company now views itself as a… Read More…

Geek of the Week: U.S. CIO Steven VanRoekel is on a mobile mission at CES

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Posting from Las Vegas: The last time we bumped into Steven VanRoekel at the Consumer Electronics Show, he was working for Microsoft, looking to transform the way people use computers in their homes. Today he’s working for President Obama, as the U.S. chief information officer — attending the show as part of his mission of… Read More…

Ballmer: Microsoft profits climb, despite still losing ‘a few billion’ on Bing

Steve Ballmer was on the hot seat in 2011

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s positive comments about the company’s financial outlook during  his Seattle Rotary Club appearance yesterday appear to be causing a minor stir in the stock market today, lifting Microsoft shares by about 1 percent. The Redmond company’s fiscal year ends today, so it’s easy to see why the numbers were on Ballmer’s… Read More…