Microsoft (MSFT) is in the early stages of a major shift as the world’s largest software company begins to compete with its vendor partners by releasing its own Windows hardware. While some believe the strategy is sound since Microsoft’s partners are too reliant on Windows to put up much of a fight, one former Microsoft executive thinks the company is “basically malfunctioning” by encroaching on its partners’ businesses. Instead, he thinks Microsoft should be dominating the social networking space.
“It seems to me that Microsoft is basically malfunctioning,” Joachim Kempin told ReadWrite in an interview. Kempin joined Microsoft in the ’80s and was with the company for nearly 20 years.
“Back in the late 1990s we had our own tablet under development,” he continued. “It never saw the light of day. When I left in 2002 people were talking about social media. We were selling phone software. But we didn’t take advantage of any of that. I’m not a big fan of Facebook (FB). I’m on Facebook, but the program is so confusing and user unfriendly. Its value lies in over 1 billion people using it and the network which runs it. The user investment is immense.”
“Microsoft should take advantage of that and do a next generation of Facebook and do it right,” Kempin said. “People would use it if they could transfer their posts with one mouse click. A Metro-like Facebook clone, and Microsoft would look way cooler than it does today. Instead the company produces its own hardware [i.e. the Surface tablets] and tries to compete with Apple (AAPL) while pissing off its loyal hardware manufacturers. Oh my God.”
The former executive also called the Xbox a “crummy product” and thinks Microsoft should spin it out.
