Microsoft

I've had a few conversations with IT executives from Fortune 500 companies in the past several weeks, and I've been surprised by how often a new enterprise-software company kept getting mentioned. The company?

Google.

Google has the problem of putting finish on a lot of its products, leaving things in eternal beta, but the price point for Google Apps is forcing even the biggest of companies to seriously consider Google instead of a Microsoft Office 2007 upgrade. (Google Apps: It's not just small customers anymore.)

We may be getting to the point where Google's "cloud&… Read more

D: All Things Digital's Kara Swisher has a nice insidery account of a meeting various Yahoo executives apparently had Thursday with Chief Executive Jerry Yang. The upshot: they (and various other Yahoo employees she said she spoke to) have mixed feelings about being subsumed by Microsoft but recoil at the prospect of acquiring AOL.

The employees she surveyed think Time Warner's AOL is "slow-moving, weak in technology, and saddled with a largely dispirited staff," Swisher said. (Unsurprisingly, that assessment is the polar opposite of that from AOL CEO Randy Falco, who pondered AOL's appeal to others … Read more

An AOL-Yahoo deal, with AOL retaining its Google search relationship, could rival Microsoft's initial $31-a-share buyout bid for Yahoo, according to Charles Di Bona, a research analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein.

That was one of three scenarios Di Bona laid out in a research note on Friday, and his favorite.

If Yahoo and AOL were to merge, Di Bona estimates that it could yield investors $28 a share. But that depends on AOL parent Time Warner kicking in $2 billion for its Yahoo stake and the combined entity generating a minimum of $500 million in synergies.

A better deal … Read more

BOGOTA, Colombia--In one corner of a massive warehouse, workers pick through bins of computers, keyboards, and mice, painstakingly cleaning each part.

There's a special room where peripherals such as mice go for washing and another where they go for drying. Once the hardware is reassembled, often with a few new parts added to the mix, the first set of testing takes place, to make sure all of the hardware functions as it should.

In another area, the newly rebuilt systems get their collection of software--Windows 2000 and a several-generations-old version of Office. Then the machines go through another round … Read more

Microsoft's Live Maps team just dropped a huge new version of its service in addition to the traffic updates from earlier Thursday.

Live Maps now offers a wealth of new features, including exporting to GPS devices, improved 3D imagery, and one of my personal favorites, MapCruncher integration.

Microsoft is rolling out its new "version 2" 3D imagery in four cities (Las Vegas, Denver, Dallas, and Phoenix) for now, with more to come later. The rest of us will have to wait and look on in envy. 3D improvements include higher-resolution textures, rendered trees, and buildings reaching farther … Read more

Poor Microsoft.

No, really.

OK, stop that. Stop that snickering.

OK, well, just a little snickering. Go ahead.

OK, done now?

OK.

But, look, they really have a tough job. Apparently -- and who could have predicted this? -- there's a cost to being everything to everyone. The Macalope doesn't envy them. They have a gazillion different users with a gazillion different requirements and hundreds (thousands?) of hardware manufacturers they have to get their software to satisfy those requirements on.

Suddenly the Apple method of making the whole enchilada doesn't seem so bad now does it?

So, … Read more

Yahoo's board is expected to debate on Friday its various options for cutting a deal with Microsoft, AOL-Time Warner, and Google, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

And while Yahoo's board is expected to discuss its options--with many insiders still seeing a Microsoft deal, sans the participation of News Corp., as the most likely outcome, the WSJ says--no major decisions are anticipated. But that may change next week, the report notes, citing a source familiar with the issue.

Yahoo is under great pressure to either engage in formal talks with Microsoft or find an attractive … Read more

SAO PAULO, Brazil--At a Las Vegas conference on Thursday, Gartner analysts warned that Windows is in danger of collapsing, according to a report in ComputerWorld.

Upon reading that, I wondered how this could have happened in the 10 days I have been traveling around Latin America. Although Microsoft faces challenges from Linux and piracy here, looking out from the company's futuristic offices, it hardly seemed like either the building or the Windows empire was in imminent danger of collapse.

Seriously, though, Gartner analyst Michael Silver appears to be noting some important long-term issues that threaten to make it harder … Read more

In 24 hours, we've gone from plain old Microhoo to Yahoogle and Microspace. What's next--Yahoobay?

Clearly, Microsoft's attempt to acquire Yahoo has prompted some serious outside-the-box thinking. But now is a good time to think carefully about what's a thought experiment with tactical value and what's a real business possibility.

First, to recap: Everybody knows that Microsoft wants to acquire Yahoo and has threatened a proxy fight and lower price if Yahoo doesn't sign up within three weeks. Another definite move is a limited Yahoo trial of search advertisements from Google, Yahoo's largest … Read more