By Betsy Schiffman April 29, 2008
The investment community likes Steve Ballmer. He's competent, aggressive and occasionally crazy. He's been at Microsoft's helm for eight years, during which time the technology landscape has drastically changed several times over. And although Microsoft hasn't always kept up, it has remained ridiculously profitable. But Wall Street loves a winner, and what happens when one of the most feared companies in the world becomes a limp, lame underdog? Nothing good. And it usually starts with the CEO's ouster. "This is a company that screwed up a real important product transition, and you've got to lay the majority of the blame at the foot of the CEO," says Paul Kedrosky, a venture capitalist and blogger. To be fair, there is nothing in Microsoft's financial results that suggests turmoil -- third-quarter earnings topped Wall Street estimates, and the outlook was decent -- but we'd still venture to guess that Steve Ballmer's days as CEO are numbered, thanks to a potentially botched Yahoo takeover, the abysmal Windows Vista release and a floundering web strategy.
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