Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era [Hardcover]

Mary Jo Foley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 5, 2008 | ISBN-10: 0470191384 | ISBN-13: 978-0470191385 | Edition: 1

Does Bill Gates?s retirement consign Microsoft to the corporate retirement home as well? Mary Jo Foley doesn?t think so. Her 25 years of Microsoft-watching provides a unique vantage point from which to speculate on how Microsoft might write its next chapter. Identifying signposts and interpreting clues she knows well, Foley offers a thought-provoking view of the software giant?s post-Gates future. Don?t be surprised to be surprised.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The award-winning journalist author has access to inside information and what she has to reveal will bring tremendous media attention".(The Bookseller, Friday 14th March 2008)

"If you need a Christmas gift for an insomniac geek, look no further." (ComputerWeekly.com, September 30, 2008)

From the Inside Flap

In the beginning, there was Bill Gates. Then were born Windows, Office, Internet Explorer, Xbox, and assorted other progeny. There were billions in revenue and tens of thousands of employees worldwide.

And above all, there was power.

But challenges arose. There were antitrust suits and rumors of more. The Internet star grew brighter. Google and AJAX and open-source technology threatened to unseat the master. Suddenly, there were murmurs of discord in Redmond paradise. Yet despite it all, the idea of Microsoft without its creator at the helm seemed unthinkable.

On July 1, 2008, the unthinkable becomes reality as Bill Gates retires from his daily responsibilities at Microsoft. From her 25 years of studying the company, Mary Jo Foley has developed sharp insight and a unique perspective on what the future might hold for Microsoft minus Gates.

This is a remarkably incisive look at leadership, potential products, management and product development styles, licensing issues, and other signposts. Who are the rising stars? What does the business model look like? Does the brass ring lie with consumer products or business solutions? What's ahead for Ray Ozzie, Steve Ballmer, and Steven Sinofsky? How will Microsoft digest future acquisitions during its "2.0" phase?

Whether you're a customer, competitor, business buff, or garden-variety consumer, this look at the next generation of one of America's corporate monoliths is riveting reading.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (May 5, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470191384
• ISBN-13: 978-0470191385
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #730,655 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Valuable information for an analyst, August 12, 2008

By 

Maxim Masiutin (Chisinau, Republic of Moldova) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era (Hardcover)

Mary Jo Foley has made a valuable contribution to investors and stock analysts. This books makes it easier to understand Microsoft's background, which kinds of business models does Microsoft employ to make money, and the future evolution of these models. This book is helpful if you are going to estimate future cash flows and calculate the intrinsic value of the company. Whichever tools do you have to your disposition as an analyst, this one is a worthy addition.

The author has done great job summarizing miscellaneous (and sporadic) sources of information like various speeches, blogs, and articles. She has also used Microsoft's SEC filings like annual and quarterly reports.

First, she introduces the reader to terms used by Microsoft, e.g. what is "eXperience", "S+S", "Office Live" and so on. Rather than copying vague definitions from the website, she really makes the reader to understand what lies behind these terms in a neutral manner.

Then, she focuses on key people of Microsoft, near-term products of Microsoft, and then devotes the most of the book to the business models. She is not a Microsoft insider and didn't have support from Microsoft key people while writing this book, thus she uses neither overly optimistic nor pessimistic voice: she is quite neutral. The fact that she is not an insider is also good because she doesn't have to do any promises that she have to keep.

There is a useful "annotated reading list", which list blogs which you might want to read to keep in touch with Microsoft. This section also lists some books, but they are quite old and are interesting only in historical perspective.

The only disadvantage of this book is that is somewhat small: more analyses and figures would have been useful for better understanding of the business models of Microsoft.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not for Tech News Geeks, September 16, 2008

By 

B. Ford - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era (Hardcover)

After reading Microsoft 2.0, here are my thoughts:

If you are a geek that reads Slashdot, Digg, and other technology news sites, it is most likely that this book is going to bore you to death. It's filled with information you most likely already know. I usually enjoy reading tech-related books, but this was the first time I was completely bored reading. I don't blame the author, she could only work with so much.

This book seems targeted at people that don't keep up with the tech industry.

Also, the author lacks the knowledge of Microsoft's gaming division and their XBox Live efforts. One could tell from reading her thoughts on XBox Live that she truly didn't understand the service. However, Microsoft is a big company, and it will be difficult for a person to be knowledgeable in all areas.

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An insightful look at where Microsoft goes once Bill Gates moves on..., May 14, 2008

By 

Thomas Duff "Duffbert" (Portland, OR United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era (Hardcover)

This is a book I've been looking forward to for some time... Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era by Mary Jo Foley. Given her long track record in covering Microsoft in tech media, I was interested to know how she perceived the behemoth as they come to a critical juncture in their leadership. I personally think she did a very good job in touching on and analyzing all the different facets that make up Microsoft's efforts to stay relevant. Only a minor deduction for an assumption she had to make late in the game that didn't play out as many expected... :)

Contents:
Forward - The Microsoft 2.0 World (According to Mini-Microsoft)
Acknowledgments
Introduction - Microsoft 2.0 - Welcome to the New (Post-Gatesian) Microsoft
Microsoft 1.0 - It Was All about Bill
Microsoft 2.0 - The Buzzwords
Microsoft 2.0 - The People
Microsoft 2.0 - Products on the Near-Term Radar Screen
Microsoft 2.0 - Big-Bet Products
Microsoft 2.0 - Tried and True Business Models
Microsoft 2.0 - Untried but Unavoidable Business Models
Conclusion - On to Microsoft 3.0
Memos, Letters, and E-mails
Annotated Reading List
Index

When you're trying to analyze a company as large as Microsoft *as it is still moving*, it's a difficult chore to commit words to page without having those same words become irrelevant (or even wrong) before the book sees the light of day. Many of the previous books on Microsoft try to tell the story of some past event, and at least have the ability to know that the story isn't going to change much. Foley had to look at the not-so-distant past, mix in the ever-changing present, and try to figure out what it all means for Microsoft once Bill Gates steps away from the company on July 1st, 2008. Given that nearly impossible task in book form, I think she accomplished what she set out to do. She's realistic in where Microsoft has succeeded and failed, without portraying an overwhelming bias as a fan-boy or hater of the company. Although the company would not grant her access to officials for this book, she has plenty of other sources to reveal little-known projects, plans, and experiments designed to keep Microsoft from constant reliance on the cash cows of Windows and Office. But it's painfully clear that Microsoft still continues (and will for the foreseeable future) to rely heavily on those two products to keep the ledger sheet green and to allow them to sink/waste vast amounts of money on other projects that still haven't panned out over time (like IPTV). After reading this book, you realize that Microsoft isn't dead, isn't irrelevant, and isn't going to go away overnight. However, they are at a critical point in their existence, where leadership, technology, and market forces are all combining to make the stakes higher than they've ever been.

To Foley's credit, she doesn't come out and "predict" Microsoft's future. Far too many industry analysts attempt to do that on a daily basis, and continually fail. What she does do is lay out the challenges and offer some insight as to where they *might* go given their track record and past history. That's incredibly useful, and also allows you to go back a couple years later to see how those forces actually played out. The only nit I had about the book surrounds the Microsoft-Yahoo proposed merger. Obviously, that event happened *very* late in the writing of the manuscript. An event of that magnitude could not be ignored without the book looking dated before it was even printed. However, the outcome of that event seemed to have different treatments as the book went along. Earlier in the book, she apparently made the decision to assume the merger would transpire and wrote as if it had. Later on, it was more of an "if the proposed merger occurs" stance. I understand she had to do something with it... It just so happens that it didn't play out as most everyone expected it to. It still doesn't negate or lessen the value of all her other insights and analysis.

You can quibble over whether she's right or wrong as much as you'd like. That's life in the tech world, as we all have our own "expert" opinions on how technology will absolutely play out. What I don't think you can argue over is whether she did her homework on this book and delivered on what she set out to do. She did... Nice job.