Microsoft has a future: Gates

Speaking at Microsoft's annual financial analysts conference the other day, chief software architect Bill Gates was doing his best to convince investors that things would get better. Vole's problem is that it only recently cracked open its cheque book to pay a dividend, which means that investors only get any money of the company when the shares increase in value. The only way that they do that is by getting bigger and investors want to know how the company that seems to have control of most of the known world get any bigger?

According to Forbes reporters, Gate's main theme at the conference was to stress that Microsoft was looking at things to flog other than its market topping Windows and Office.

He mentioned search engines, but his main theme was gadgets for mobile phones and milking more cash out of things like Windows Media Center. Other technologies demonstrated included advanced photo-browsing software, speech-recognition software, and an updated operating system for Tablet PCs.

Gates tried to point out that the company was spending billions on R&D. He said Vole had more than 3,000 patents that it was applying for, although he failed to mention that some of these were for technology that was many years old.

He also added that it was hiring 6,000 to 7,000 employees worldwide during this year, however he did not point out that some of these were replacements for people who have left.

Microsoft Chief Executive Steve 'sound of silence' Ballmer also had a go. He quietly told the conference that the company believes it has strong prospects for significant profit growth in the next four years. Ballmer declined to give specific numbers.

In fact he confused some analysts by trying to put it in terms of other companies. According to Seattlepi.com Steve said that over the next four years, Microsoft might be able to "grow a whole Nokia, a whole Siemens, or potentially even a whole Intel". He didn't say exactly what he meant, but the image of Steve in the Microsoft greenhouse planting little mobile phones and chips must be reassuring to shareholders.

So it seems that Gates and Ballmer are hoping to spin investors into thinking the company is going to get bigger. Still it has worked before. µ

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