Microsoft CEO predicts big things for next decade

(NECN: Peter Howe, Boston) – It was like Hurricane Steve blowing into the Boston College CEO’s Club Friday: Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer, fired up about the future of innovation — and talking a little trash about rival Apple. In a speech to over 500 Boston business leaders at the Intercontinental Hotel, Ballmer was asked about Apple’s television ads that deride Microsoft-powered personal computers with a schlumpy, bald nerd who looks suspiciously like a cross between Ballmer and Microsoft founder Bill Gates. Ballmer’s response: “About 96 percent of the world’s computers are PC’s, and 4 percent are Macs. And thanks to their advertising, everybody kind of knows the difference. I like 96. They like 4, I guess,” Ballmer said to laughter. CLICK HERE to listen to more of Ballmer’s address. But mostly, Ballmer’s theme was: If you thought this last decade was big for technology innovation, with the cellphone and Internet going from techie fringe to mainstream America, just wait till you see what’s next. “Our industry has a long way to go,” Ballmer said. Waving a sheaf of papers, he said, “Next five to ten years, we really will have digital screens that are this thin, this flexible, this light” with wireless digital Internet connections. Ballmer also predicted a new era for television sets that people can control through their voices and hand motions. “Every television set will be an interactive digital device that you will activate with your voice and your gestures. You’ll be watching that Patriots game,” Ballmer said, and he imagined sending a clip of a great tackle to Bill Gates through the Internet with a voice memo added on. “Hey, Bill! Did you see that hit! Boom! It’ll find Bill Gates wherever he is, assuming he wants to let me interrupt him and, voom, it’ll take him exactly to that point in the game because — I don’t know, maybe he’s watching some tennis match or something. Boom!” “I see more opportunity for more IT (information technology) innovation to have a more profound impact on society even than the last five or ten years,” Ballmer said. That was a forecast echoed by EMC Corp. CEO Joseph Tucci, who introduced Ballmer to the BC CEO Club crowd. “I personally expect that in the next five years,” Tucci said, “We’ll see more technology coming at us and our lives will change more than they have in the last ten.” Howe: Of course a big question is how does a company as big as Microsoft — now 95,000 employees worldwide, including 700 in New England, a Dow Jones Industrial Average blue-chip company — stay innovative and nimble enough to make such breakthroughs happen quickly?” Technology venture capitalist Bob Davis of Highland Capital Partners, who engineered the $11 billion sale of Lycos.com to Spanish telecommunications company Terra Networks in 2000, said, “Is it hard for Microsoft to innovate? Yeah. Is it hard for anyone to innovate? Of course it is. I would never wake up and want to bet against Microsoft. They’re an omnipotent, ubiquitous business that’s been at this for a very, very long time.” Davis added that he was struck by Ballmer’s energy and presence: “The enthusiasm that this man has is to me a pretty powerful thing. He’s the type of guy that you see yourself just rallying behind and running through walls for.” In his address, Ballmer noted that “sharks, they move forward or they die. Technology companies either move forward or they die too. And so you constantly have to be pushing into new areas … We just keep coming and keep tenacious and hopefully that works.” And with $31 billion in cash on hand and a computer operating system so widespread it’s regulated by the government as a court-certified monopoly, Microsoft will never lack the money or resources to try something new.