Microsoft step up Google challenge
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, in Japan to launch new Windows Live services, has signalled his company are prepared to lose money online to compete with Google.
According to an article in the International Herald Tribune, Ballmer accepted that Google were currently in a strong position in the search market but added, “We’re in an investment mode [in online business].”
Microsoft is no stranger to using its considerable resources to prop up new or struggling divisions; it’s reported that they made a loss of $6 billion on their original Xbox games console. The launch of its successor, the Xbox 360, was largely responsible for Microsoft’s home entertainment division posting a loss of $1.26 billion in 2006. Then again, it’s not like they can’t stand it; the company recently posted quarterly profits of $4.29 billion.
Although Google’s lead in the search market is beyond question, Ballmer was more confident about other online business activities, “Google is not ahead of us,” he told Tokyo reporters. “In the area of search specifically, Google would lead.” He went on to dismiss Google’s recent entry into the mobile market, the Android software package for mobile phones, referring to the project as “just words on paper”.
Microsoft clearly have high hopes for their Live services, but they have a lot of ground to make up on Google, whose increasing global market share now sees them handling over half of the search requests made on the planet.
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