The question that won't go away What comes after

In the course of an appearance in the Citi International Technology Conference on September four, Microsoft Chief Monetary Officer Chris Liddell confronted the exact same question that he;s been answering for months: What is Microsoft;s on the web technique now that the provider has decided in opposition to buying Yahoo?And Liddell;s solution to that query hasn;t transformed: Microsoft will keep on to grow its via the internet organization organically although producing scaled-down acquisitions within the area.Liddell spoke and fielded questions for near to an hour. He brushed aside one attendee;s query about Microsoft;s ideas on Google;s not too long ago introduced Chrome browser by stating Microsoft continually fields new competition across all of its products. (Liddell;s hasty dismissal looked especially poor, given the newest browser stats displaying Net Explorer continuing to lose marketplace share, albeit, just a position.)Other Liddellisms from his appearance (which I listened to via Webcast):* He mentioned Microsoft was organizing back again in December 2007 on producing the Xbox cost cuts it announced this week. He said the cuts had been currently embedded within the business;s financial assistance with it provided Wall Road analysts this summer time.* Liddell referred to as Microsoft;s via the internet group the part with the business he is “least happy with,” but mentioned again Microsoft views online as a “multi-year journey” in which it will continue on to invest for the foreseeable future.* He said to expect Microsoft to spend half of its $2 billion in capital expenditures within the coming year on improving basic facilities for all of its employees and the other half on building out is internet datacenter infrastructure.* Microsoft still could be interested in a search deal with Yahoo, Liddell said, despite the fact that he known as the former Microsoft acquisition target a “declining asset.” He also cautioned attendees that Microsoft won;t suddenly go out and make another large on the net acquisition “just to get scale.”* He mentioned Vista is a product that “we (Microsoft) feel better about internally than others feel externally about it.” He cited Gartner predictions that by the end of this year Vista will be installed on more PCs than XP was at this point in its lifecycle.1 question I was curious about — besides Liddell;s take on Chrome — but which no 1 asked: Why is CEO Steve Ballmer keynoting the Consumer Electronics Show in January? Microsoft had definitely led folks to believe that Microsoft President of Entertainment and Devices Robbie Bach would be filling Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates; shoes in that annual ritual? (Maybe it;s simply because all of the other CES keynoters are CEOs ?)I also would have echoed another conference attendee;s question about Windows 7 and Office 14 — namely, if Microsoft really is intending on fielding the final versions of its next-generation Windows and Office releases in 2009, as I and others are hearing, when the heck are the semi-public and/or public betas for these products going out? Liddell refused to comment.