Let’s remember when Steve Ballmer became CEO of Microsoft, on this day in 2000 (January 13)
Steven Allen Ballmer was the thirtieth employee of Microsoft, joining the emerging tech company in 1980. He became president in 1998 and succeeded Bill Gates as CEO on January 13, 2000.
It has been a mixed tenure for Ballmer, as measured by things business people care about. Revenue more almost tripled during his tenure, launched several successful products (and also several duds) and Microsoft settled their antitrust case with the federal government. Not bad! But it was also a rocky time for Microsoft as other tech companies emerged as competitors to Microsoft’s global hegemony. Some things, like Google’s creation of Google Docs and the rise of open source operating systems weren’t his fault, but there were other blunders that happened on his watch, like the flop of Windows Vista, getting into the smartphone market and whatever the hell Zune was.
Ballmer resigned as CEO in 2014, and was replaced by Satya Nadella, who quickly made a name for himself by speaking at the Grace Hopper Celeberation of Women in Computing later that year. Nadella said women shouldn’t ask for raises and instead believe in karma to take care of any pay disparities. Good move!
Meanwhile, Ballmer spends his time at as owner of the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team, which he bought when previous owner Donald Sterling was outed as a racist.
For further reading:
Also, I feel a little bad for this:
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