Info Tech
Microsoft hopes new, old leaders can rekindle magic
NEW YORK – Microsoft Corp is betting a mix of old and young blood will revive the aging technology pioneer, but new Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella may find it tough to push change with co-founder Bill Gates and former CEO Steve Ballmer breathing down his neck.
The 46-year-old India native and former enterprise business chief takes on the monumental task of exploring new directions – but with Gates as his consigliere, and on a strategy that Ballmer orchestrated with the board.
That uphill endeavor helped sour other candidates on the job, including proven change agent Alan Mulally at Ford Motor Co, sources have said.
Gates is giving up the board chairmanship to fellow director John Thompson. That, plus Nadella’s promotion, marks a changing of the guard at a 39-year-old company that fueled the PC revolution, but is struggling with its longer-term identity after missing the boat on the mobile computing revolution.
“You’ve got a triumvirate running the company: Satya as the new CEO, Bill as the product adviser and John Thompson running the board. A lot depends on how the three of them get along,” said Bill George, Harvard Business School professor and former Medtronic Inc CEO.
“The big question I have is, is Satya really going to be allowed to make the transformative changes that Microsoft needs to make, both at the product level and at the people level?”
Microsoft shares closed 0.4 percent lower at $36.35 on the Nasdaq on Tuesday.
The new Microsoft focuses on “devices and services” rather than licensing software, and seeks to emulate Apple’s success in marrying popular online services with attractive gadgets.
Set by the retiring Ballmer last year, that vision has proven unpopular with investors hoping either that Microsoft will stop plowing billions into mobile devices – as it is doing with its Nokia acquisition – or come up with new products to take on mobile leaders Apple Inc and Google Inc.
“From a bigger-picture perspective, I don’t think much is going to change,” said Sid Parakh, an analyst at fund firm McAdams Wright Ragen. “The strategy that was put in place in 2013 is where the company is headed.”
On Tuesday, Gates – who may again become a regular sight around Microsoft’s Redmond, Washington, campus after pledging to spend a third of his time as the new CEO’s adviser – stressed that Nadella’s cloud computing expertise qualified him to lead Microsoft into the new arena of mobile computing.
“Satya’s got the right background to lead the company during this era,” he said. “There’s a challenge in mobile computing. There’s an opportunity in the cloud.”
Nadella got a rich pay rise on his promotion, with a salary of $1.2 million, a maximum annual cash bonus of three times that and a stock award of $13.2 million for next fiscal year.
That is much more than the moderately paid Ballmer, who took home less than $1.3 million last year, chiefly because of his refusal to take stock awards, which he deemed unnecessary given his ownership of $12 billion worth of Microsoft shares.
Nadella’s pay is modest in comparison to tech superstar Marissa Mayer, who got a compensation package that could total more than $70 million when she took the helm at Yahoo Inc two years ago.
PROS, CONS
The online element may play to the strengths of Nadella, who led the creation of Microsoft’s Internet, or cloud, services.
Nadella has pushed the company in the direction of an Internet-based future, using its network of vast data centers to host products such as Office 365, a subscription-based online version of its ubiquitous business software.
He “bashed heads together on the product teams to get them to support cloud deployment in a consistent way,” said Ted Schadler, an analyst at tech research firm Forrester. “Every software company has to engineer this shift to software as a service, because 10 years from now there’ll be no such thing as a licensed piece of software.”
Nadella is only its third CEO in 39 years, taking over from Ballmer, who inherited the job from Gates in 2000. His appointment ends a five-month search process triggered by the August announcement of Ballmer’s decision to retire.
That was longer than many investors had expected.
“It’s a relief this process is over,” said Daniel Ives, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets. “Many investors view it as the ‘safe pick’ as Mr. Nadella is a born-and-bred Redmond insider. But the uphill battle continues for Microsoft on its path to growth.”
The move is also a significant shift for Gates, who along with Apple’s Steve Jobs was one of the key forces who shaped the personal computer revolution of the late 20th century, making him an icon of the new information economy and the world’s richest person in the process.
Gates, 58, left day-to-day work at Microsoft in 2008 to focus on philanthropy at his Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which he says is still his main job. He owns 4.3 percent of Microsoft’s outstanding shares.
“Satya’s asked me to step up, substantially increasing the time that I spend at the company,” Gates said in a video statement. “I’ll have over a third of my time available to meet with product groups. It’ll be fun to define this next round of products, working together.”
Nadella, who describes himself as a cricket and poetry lover, called the appointment “humbling” in an email to employees. In a videotaped statement, he said he would focus on “ruthlessly” removing any obstacles to innovation.
Apart from Ford Motor’s Mulally, Nadella also beat out other candidates for the job. Several were close to the company, like Stephen Elop, set to rejoin Microsoft when its acquisition of Nokia’s handset business closes, and Tony Bates, the former Skype boss now in charge of business development.
Most agree that Nadella’s background makes him a safe pair of hands to take the company forward, but there remains a question over his ability to make Microsoft a hit with consumers or with impatient shareholders.
Even as Microsoft faces a slow erosion of its PC-centric Windows and Office franchises, some investors are campaigning for retrenchment and a bigger cut of the company’s cash pile.
ValueAct Capital, which led a shareholder revolt last year that culminated in Ballmer’s retirement, has pushed for the company to abandon ambitions to be a hardware maker, focus on its strengths with business software and return more capital.
That means refocusing on Office and Windows and distributing more of Microsoft’s $84 billion in cash and short-term investments, though most of that is held overseas.
Nadella’s immediate task may be to balance the demands of long- and short-term investors.
“That’s a balance that John Thompson is going to provide,” said Parakh.
– REUTERS
In efforts at spicing up the 2023 ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue, the management of ITREALMS Media has partnered with E-waste Producer Responsibility Organization of Nigeria (EPRON) membership organisations for a day-long collection scheme of small electronic waste on Friday, December 15, 2023.
The EPRON members aligning their partnership with 2023 ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue are EL-AS Tech Enterprises Limited and WEEE Eco-Friendly.
ITREALMS’ day-long collection scheme is part of the commemoration of 2023 international E-Waste Day (IEWD) within the ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue with the theme “You Can Recycle Anything with a plug, battery or cable” at Welcome Centre Hotels, International Airport Road, Lagos.
Revealing this collaboration, the Group Executive Editor, ITREALMS Media, the organisers of the 2023 ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue, Sir. Remmy Nweke, urged mobile device enthusiasts to come along with their devices that have reached their end-of-life to the venue for proper disposition by professionals who would also be on grounds to address some topical issues.
The collection of small electronic wastes especially mobile phones and like-devices, would be carried out by EPRON member organisation, EL-AS Tech Enterprises Limited as facilitated by ITREALMS Media group as part of this year’s ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue on Friday, December 15, he added.
He disclosed that the exercise would commence at Welcome Centre Hotel by 9am till close of work hours the same day.
Nweke pointed out that the collection of small e-waste items would include mobile phones, pointers mouse, earpieces, rechargeable torches, phone chargers, to name a few.
Further, he said, that this initiative has become time-serving because some people may have missed any other opportunity before now for the year-long campaign, hence this awareness on e-Waste has to be continuous, “ITREALMS came up with this scheme.”
Nweke beckoned on Nigerians, especially mobile phone users, to leverage the opportunity in disposing of their mobile devices they no longer use, of course in exchange for a voucher or gift item.
In her reaction to this year’s day-long small waste collection, EPRON Executive Secretary, Mrs. Ibukun Faluyi, described the initiative as commendable, expressing confidence it would intensify the collection of end-of-life devices for proper disposition.
Mrs. Faluyi, also urged Nigerians to take advantage of this day-long collection of small wastes courtesy of ITREALMS Media.
Recalling for instance that in October 2022, EPRON had partnered SLOT alongside some UN agencies for collection of small e-waste items in Lagos, including the United Nations Information Centres (UNIC), United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), International Labour Organisation (ILO), Lagos Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) and Lagos State Environmental Protection Agency (LASEPA).
This is even as the Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) Dr. Aminu Maida and Director-General, National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA), Prof. Aliyu Jauro, would both lead speakers at the 2023 ITREALMS E-Waste Dialogue slated for this Friday, December 15, in Lagos.
Today, September 12, the tech corporation Apple will introduce the iPhone 15, their newest iPhone model.
According to a Forbes story, this model, which will be introduced at the company’s “Wanderlust” event in Cupertino, California, will be available in four variations: the iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max.
Here are five things you should know about the new iPhone 15 model.
1. The new model is made of titaniu, not stainless steel as some other Apple smartphone models, Senior research analyst at DIGITIMES, Luke Lin reports.
2. The Pro Max model will feature double the optical zoom on the iPhone 14 as it comes with a newly-introduced ‘periscope lens upgrade, performing 5-6x optical zoom.’
3. The Pro models will carry an A17 bionic chip expected to make it perform faster.
4. The iPhone 15 model will feature a USB-C charging port, the same port featured on some Android phone models.
5. Due to its titanium shell, the new model is anticipated to be more expensive to purchase. The following is the speculated price list, as reported by Forbes:
The iPhone 15 starts at $799, the iPhone 15 Plus at $899, the iPhone 15 Pro at $1,099 ($100 increase), and the iPhone 15 Pro Max at $1,299 ($200 increase).
In an effort to reduce the exorbitant cost of Premium Motor Spirit, better known as petrol, the Infrastructure Bank Plc announced its collaboration with FEMADEC Group on Monday to offer 500 buses powered by autogas (Compressed Natural Gas).
Partners in the agreement claimed that the project was created to provide citizens with dependable, affordable, and environmentally friendly travel options, taking into account the negative effects of the nationwide increase in PMS costs.
Under Decree No. 51 of the Federal Republic of Nigeria’s 1992 Constitution, the Infrastructure Bank, originally known as the Urban Development Bank of Nigeria Plc, was founded in 1992 to promote the quick development of infrastructure throughout the nation.
In a statement issued in Abuja on its partnership with FEMADEC, the bank said, “The preliminary offer extended by TIB lays a solid foundation for the expansion of FEMADEC Group’s CNG bus fleet.
“With plans to introduce 500 CNG buses within the next five years, commencing with an initial batch of 50 buses in the forthcoming year, this proposal stands poised to instigate significant change.
“The acceptance of this proposition by FEMADEC Group, notably championed by Fola Akinnola, the Group Chief Executive Officer, is a testament to their zeal and dedication to this alliance.”
The bank described the partnership as a “pivotal endeavour that is primed to redefine Nigeria’s public transportation landscape, offering dependable, cost-effective, and ecologically conscious travel alternatives for citizens, while harmonising with the nation’s broader sustainability ambitions.”
“This partnership represents a remarkable stride towards a more ecologically aware future for Nigeria’s transportation sector, highlighting the shared commitment of both TIB and FEMADEC Group to sustainable advancement and progress.”
It said FEMADEC Group’s strides in operating Compressed Natural Gas buses, including the existing fleet of 20 CNG buses under LAMATA, underscored their unwavering dedication to ecologically sound solutions, a commitment predating the fuel subsidy removal.
“Their leadership within the CNG value chain is undeniable, and the new alliance with TIB underscores their foresight.
“This partnership seamlessly aligns with TIB’s sustainability objectives, echoing their resolute endorsement of the government’s net-zero and climate change agenda.
“The bank’s aspiration to champion Nigeria’s infrastructure progress is evident in its endorsement of pivotal initiatives like this, yielding expansive positive impacts on both the environment and society,” the bank stated.
The bank added that it would continue to make a significant contribution to the country’s growth as a leading financial institution committed to advancing effective and long-lasting infrastructure projects.
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