Ballmer: ActiveSync on iPhone, ponders Silverlight
updated 12:40 pm EST, Fri March 7, 2008
Ballmer on iPhone SDK
Steve Ballmer recently sat down with Guy Kawasaki at the Mix 2008 conference in Las Vegas, where Kawasaki asked him about his feelings on Apple's iPhone developer announcements yesterday. According to CNET, Ballmer thinks that Silverlight on the iPhone would be interesting, but somewhat dismissed the idea. He says that there has been no official conversations with Apple CEO Steve Jobs on the matter, and Apple's business model of taking 30-percent of revenue is questionable.
One user comment on the story humorously points out that 30-percent of free is still free, in response to Apple's offer of "picking up the tab" on free applications. Accounting that Microsoft purchases a developer certification for $100, they would incur no additional costs regarding the distribution of a free application.
Kawasaki also probed Ballmer regarding the licensing of ActiveSync for the iPhone's interoperability with Microsoft Exchange servers.
"We've licensed ActiveSync for a while. That's been an option that's been available to Apple," Ballmer said. "It was certainly an option we knew Apple might take advantage of."
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Nov 1999
Ballmer Spin
30% of revenue is much cheaper than other "smart phones" including those hosted on Microsoft operating systems. Handango charges 50% and above, and does not provide as easy download of purchased applications as that proposed by Apple. The funny part is that Microsoft certainly knows this, so spinning is required as a means of preventing further loss in an area which they have a decade of investment.