[Info-vax] Maybe a bit OT, maybe not.. in any case an interesting article

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 5/14/2012 6:49 PM, John Wallace wrote:
> On May 14, 2:35 pm, koeh... at eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob
> Koehler) wrote:
>> In article<joo1u9$em... at solani.org>, Michael Kraemer<M.Krae... at gsi.de>  writes:
>>
>>> So when can we expect M$ to go away?
>>
>>       M$ is slipping.  But not very fast ,and they have a long way to go.
>>     The day will come.
>
> It's not that long ago that people were saying things like "Nokia is
> slipping.  But not very fast ,and they have a long way to go."
>
> Now look where they have ended up (and who has led them there).
>
> What stops something similar happening to MS in the retail market
> three years from now, and in the corporates a little later? Obviously
> it may NOT happen, but...

It could happen.

But migration from a true MS only environment is not that
easy.

Your server side stuff are in ASP.NET and SQLServer stored
procedures. Your documents and other files are in Sharepoint.
Your emails and calendar information is in Exchange. All the
documents are in Word and Excel formats. You have some only
work in IE web apps. You have desktop apps written in .NET.

It will take many years to migrate of.

And MS are sitting on a ton of cash. Per March 31st
they had 59 B$ in cash, cash equivalents and short
term investments (primarily US treasuries).

They can do a lot with that cash if they want/need to.

Among other things they could buy HP in a cash deal
(HP market cap is only 45 B$ today).

It can certainly be debated whether that would be
a good investment.

Arne