06.18.15
Amid Microsoft Collapse Stephen Elop is Finally ‘Fired’, But Not Before He Cost Many Thousands of People (at Nokia) Their Job, Destroyed Linux-based Platforms, and Spread Patents to Patent Trolls
Stephen Elop has a long track record of corporate destruction (his expertise)
Summary: Lesser-explored aspects of Microsoft’s corporate sinking, which the company disguises as ‘shakeup’ while releasing (yet again) its demolition man, Stephen Elop
THIS post tackles various issues that the corporate media overlooked. First, Elop’s exit merits more analysis and retrospection; second, Microsoft’s state is much more revealing right now, as well as Microsoft’s stance on Google and Android; finally, comments are needed about Elop’s legacy, which makes the world a much more dangerous place for Free/libre software.
The big news isn’t Elop being fired but Microsoft setting itself on fire after a misguided strategy which revolved around destruction rather than creation (giving Nokia’s patents to patent trolls, killing Nokia’s multiple Linux efforts, and so on). Many executives are leaving in droves right now and we are hardly surprised. There are certainly more layoffs on the way, but puff pieces like this new one from Microsoft sympathiser Mark Hachman (of the shameful IDG) serve to distract from that. More “restricted boot with uefi” is Microsoft’s last hope, assures us a reader, basically ensuring it is exceptionally hard to remove Vista/7/8/10 from PCs after OEMs were bribed to preinstall it.
Tackling the media’s narrative in this case, let’s look at the repetition of deceptive terminology. The media repeats Microsoft’s words, but here is the basic rule (based on history): when Microsoft says “reorg” it means layoffs and “shakeup” means key managers are fleeing/abandoning. We wrote about this for nearly a decade. Common euphemisms like “shake-ups” (with or without a dash) or “reorg” (for layoffs) are very frequent an utterance at Microsoft and it’s all damage control. Corporate journalists don’t do their job; they don’t look any further or any deeper.
What we really have here is a departure of Mark Penn, Microsoft’s anti-Google guy [1, 2, 3, 4] (and by extension anti-Android guy). He is out, so Microsoft’s strategy to incite against Google must have failed pretty badly. Quoting damage control from Microsoft’s booster, “Eric Rudder, whose Microsoft bio indecisively describes him as both Vice President of Advanced Technology and Education, and Vice President of Advanced Strategy, is also leaving.” Rudder, a longtime thug from Microsoft (see and recall his role in dirty tricks [1, 2, 3]), was probably essential to Microsoft’s abusive monopoly. They are attacking GNU/Linux behind the scenes. They are top-level executives — people who rally the troops and pressure (or bribe, or blackmail) other executives, even politicians. Their departure is probably a news bigger than Elop’s ‘departure’ (more on that later).
The Nokia angle was covered the most (as the leading story), but almost nobody mentioned that Elop got a massive bonus for destroying Nokia and passing it to Microsoft. He is a very rich man, having made a lot money from demolition.
Nokia expert Tomi Ahonen wrote:
So the Elop nonsense and destructive managment methods lasted only 15 months under Satya Nadella’s watchful eye at Microsoft. He is effectively fired from Microsoft. The company realigns handsets into one division under Windows headed by Exec VP Terry Myers. And Elop plus two other senior execs are kicked out with the press release out today.
Good riddance. Stephen Elop was the worst CEO in corporate history. He clearly was at fault on the top, when he went to Microsott, that same ex-Nokia handset unit with Lumia running on Windows Phone never did any better. Today we’ve seen new Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella examine Elop’s performance of the flagship future division – you remember Nadella’s introductory remarks to his employees were all about mobile and the cloud – now Elop is gone. And look at the text of the press release. Not one word about ‘mobile’ or ‘handsets’ or ‘Lumia’ in the actual announcements (only one mention on the bottom from the description of Microsoft the company being a ‘mobiile-first’ company). What a huge shift away from the failing Lumia unit to ‘Windows and Devices’ ie Surface will do fine, Xbox is doing fine. Lumia is dead.
Now someone will be running the Lumia unit under Exec VP Myers for a while, and then when they see it is irretrievably dead, they will quietly shut down that business. This is a VERY clear sign of the writing on the wall. And sadly for any ex-Nokia employees, expect more layoffs to come in the aftermath of this announcement and the ‘consolidation’ within that new business unit. I think the ex-Nokia handset unit has no more than 24 months ahead of this point, and may be shut down far faster than that. Clearly Nadella knows how to read mathematics and the math about Elop’s business was brutal. Elop is gone! A day of somber celebrtaions in Finland and all who were fired by that clown will think – at least he also got fired.
Finally good news from Microsoft because it shows that it’s dying, much like its efforts to derail Android. As iophk put it: “none, not even Ahonen, remind us that Elop was a mole and fulfilled the sale to Microsoft as a requirement for receiving his 25m bonus.”
Nadella’s hogwash of corporate collapse (in his E-mail) is hilarious if properly dissected. To quote the British media, “Nadella said in an email to employees: “We are aligning our engineering efforts and capabilities to deliver on our strategy and, in particular, our three core ambitions.
“This change will enable us to deliver better products and services that our customers love at a more rapid pace.””
Nadella is talking complete nonsense. It was probably written by someone else (PR) and just signed by Nadella. Nilay Patel asks (in his headline), “What company will Stephen Elop steal for Microsoft next?”
He dubs Elop “Trojan Horse, King of Thieves” and says: “So now that Elop is free to roam the badlands once again, it’s only fair to ask what new company he might infiltrate as part of an elaborate Microsoft M&A strategy. Here’s a quick list.”
Watch how Elop destroyed companies before he even joined Microsoft. He is a very evil Trojan horse and it’s important to check where he goes next. He is a demolition man, not a manager. Therein lies the real story. █
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