Summary: As Steve Ballmer takes more operations to India and receives flak for poor leadership, a German magazine foresees/predicts major change

"Ballmer's departure seems to be imminent," wrote to us a reader from Germany last night. "A major German business & management magazine has already published a "funeral" eulogy about Microsoft and Ballmer. Right on their cover: http://www.wiwo.de/"

A few days ago, amid a lot of disdain such as this, Ballmer was defended by Bill Gates, but it might not be enough now that Microsoft performs poorly and takes additional debt.

"Steve Ballmer and the (Gloomy) Future of Microsoft" is the title of another new post which quotes:

...Not everyone buys this BS. One blogger, Horace Dediu, offers what many believe is the right explanation: Robbie Bach was fired because he lost the HP account. As the largest PC maker, HP is a hugely important Microsoft customer. A few weeks ago, HP acquired Palm for its WebOS smartphone software platform. The slap in Microsoft’s face still resonates; it’s a verdict on the failed Windows Mobile offering and a negative prognosis on its upcoming Windows Phone 7 Series operating system for smartphones. Days after the acquisition, Mark Hurd, HP’s CEO, let it be known that WebOS will be used in connected printers. As a final blow, HP’s (future) Slate Tablet, once held high as a Windows 7 device, will also use Palm’s WebOS.

According to another report a reader told us about yesterday, "Microsoft ranks India over Silicon Valley" (possibly a sign of cost savings to come).

Even though Indian CIOs are largely sceptical about the “revolutionising” cloud computing, Microsoft boss, Steve Ballmer has taken an attempt to silence the critics of cloud computing in India.

The Microsoft CEO has ranked India’s prospects over Silicon valley’s in terms of growth in cloud computing. Ballmer firmly believes India would become the global hub for cloud computing which might take the world by storm.

This is part of an ongoing trend we've been covering for months if not years. Ballmer's behaviour has made a lot of people angry (see video below) and he became a PR disaster for Microsoft; in a way, it'll better for GNU/Linux if he stays. ⬆

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