How much money it did to MS?

it seems silly to want to kill off stuff that is just starting to hold its own. Xbox and Bing are just starting to generate profit. It would be a waste of money and effort to nurture this stuff from nothing and then kill it or sell it off to somebody elses benefit.

As far as surface... I'm torn. Personally, I think the device is a joke. However, the market is clearly moving away from the tradition pc setup to a more mobile tablet/phone market. Third parties haven't been having a lot of luck pushing the windows os in that market and are starting to gravitate more towards android. So obviously microsoft needs to do something about it or long term they are going to fade away. Microsoft needs to innovate and do something new in this space if they want to compete, not just follow. If they do that with their surface line, fine, but as of now the line is junk...

Wooow o.O That's actually kind of impressive in a backwards way.

I'd want the same if I owned stock. Focus on what you do the best which is windows and software.

I wonder if investors want Microsoft to kill Xbox because they've got stock in Nintendo or Sony.  Microsoft put a lot of resources in the development of the Xbox One, so they'll lose a lot of money just throwing that away.  As long as third party software sells, Microsoft should be profitable with the Xbox One so long as they don't buy anymore exclusives.

You don't take risk and you will be left in the dust. Investors are always going complain. They won't sell off any of it. it's just time before they see the results and back the products. If MS doesn't change and take chances, I think that stands more of a mistake then taken on new goals. Windows can't hold them up forever as the investors believe.

Most investors look at short term profits, not long term.

Xbox is in a tough spot, to be competitive it needs a price cut but that would piss of investors even more. With out one it cant compete vs the PS4

I never got the point for Xbox hardware, xbox should have been a developer and publisher from the get go. A modern gaming app to be implemented on all platforms from windows to PS Nintendi IOS and android. Make money of your competitors not lose it fighting them.

MS just came from a record setting quarter and inverters want them to simply, play it safe? Xbox has been profiting for years now.... What?!? Get rid of a profitable section?

The only xbox line in there is from last year.... He wasn't CEO last year....

Some investors have suggested that Microsoft spin off its money-losing consumer products and focus solely on the enterprise. Even the Xbox deserves to go, Paul Ghaffari, the wealth manager for Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, said last year.

Check out the Windows app store.  Microsoft just released a Server app to administer servers with.  Not sure how useful it is, but worth checking out.

IMO I don't see what the issue is which keeping XBOX around if it is making money. The argument that they could shift manpower into areas which make them a higher ROE is a bit faulty. For one, all the hardware engineers don't really even fit into the company if they go services based. Game designers would just go to other game studious. Honestly the only people who they could put into new positions are the ones who manage the Interface OS, but even they I have always felt like the XBOX OS team was their "B Team" anyways.

See all this MS stuff they want to can is the shit Balmer came up with to fight apple (more of a hardware focused company) but instead competing with apple they are getting beaten badly in consumer HW products and have lost a bit of their core business.