Steve Ballmer Initially Faced Opposition Of Gates And Nadella On Nokia Deal

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In September 2013, Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) unveiled its plan to purchase Nokia’s Devices & Services business in a EUR 5.44 billion deal. Recently, a new report is published that highlights the events that directs to the declaration and its consequences. According to report, the Nokia Corporation (ADR) (NYSE:NOK) agreement has strong connections with the retirement of Steve Ballmer and the ultimate employment of Satya Nadella as the new Microsoft CEO.

The CEO Steve Ballmer faced some opposition from the company’s executives as they raised question about this deal that whether Microsoft operates as a software company or a hardware company too as he gave the idea of the Nokia agreement, according to a report by Bloomberg Businessweek. Primarily Satya Nadella and Bill Gates, Ballmer’s long time friend among others strongly resisted this contract.

The people familiar with the subject said that many of co-founder and directors and then-Chairman Bill Gates – Ballmer’s long-time friend and supporter strongly condemned this idea of purchasing smartphone unit. Similarly Nadella was also against this deal but he changed his mind about this idea later. At the same time, Tony Bates who is leaving the company earlier this week after Satya Nadella’s first executive change was also not happy with this contract. He joined Microsoft after the acquisition of Skype.

The people familiar with matter also said that the purchase wasn’t generally well-liked even on Ballmer’s senior team. A number of executives firstly voted against it like Bates and Nadella in the straw poll. However, Nadella joined Ballmer later but Bates remains strict to its point of opposition. In the meantime, Bill Gates also had serious concerns about growing its hardware business of the company. Gates is not happy with idea that the world’s largest software maker should experiment making its own smartphones and Ballmer got upset that Gates had opposed his idea, according to the report.

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