Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : How high will Microsoft fly? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: KM who wrote (16779)	2/23/1999 1:32:00 PM
From: Rusty Johnson	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74651

MSFT retains over 90% of the desktop ... regardless of the outcome of the trial. Company hard at work outside the courtroom seattletimes.com Meanwhile, two Microsoft-backed business groups have issued reports in recent weeks to bolster its positions. Citizens Against Government Waste last week criticized the amount of money it estimated the government had spent prosecuting the case. Another group, the Association for Competitive Technology , issued a survey it commissioned showing that most information-technology managers do not favor the breakup of the company if Microsoft is found guilty of antitrust violations. The group, funded by Microsoft, was created to oppose the suit. Seriously ... why does MSFT create groups like this? It makes them look ridiculous. Do Bill and Steve REALLY think we're that stupid? On second thought ... we buy Windows don't we? The big problem is they can't design a stable operating system. If they (accidentally and by some miracle) make SnakeOil 2000 stable ... they will REALLY make some money.

To: KM who wrote (16779)	2/23/1999 4:17:00 PM
From: Punko	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74651

>> Call 'em Consumer Products, Enterprise (i.e., corporate) Products, Developer Products and Knowledge Workers' Needs. This article raises an interesting possibility. Could Microsoft be setting the stage for its own breakup? Organizing into these 4 divisions would essentially perforate the company along these lines for a straightforward divestiture. The Enterprise, Developer, and Knowledge Worker divisions would address a great deal of the anti-competitive issues in front of the court, since NT (which presumably would belong to the Enterprise division) is far from a monopoly in the enterprise space. Developer and Knowledge Worker orgs would not have anything akin to a 'monopoly' platform. This leaves the consumer group. There, Windows is still widely perceived as a monopoly platform, so continuing to allow development of apps by this division would not do anything to remedy that group's future efforts to 'extend the monopoly into other areas', which I'm supposing is one of the doj's objectives. Another question is how assets (most notably that huge wad of cash) would be distributed among these possible baby bills. One option would be to appropriate these 10's of billions for Bill Clinton's legal defense fund, where he'll need every penny. (Don't laugh, he's gotten away with worse). But seriously, it would make sense to me for it to be divvied up in accordance with percentage of earnings derived from owned products. Interesting...