三大战略收购有望助微软再度颠覆科技行业

    由于投资者对微软公司（Microsoft）未来发展丧失了信心，微软股价一直停滞不前。2000年初，微软股价达到峰值，接近60美元，随后当年晚些时候就跌到22美元，此后14年间基本上在25美元到40美元之间徘徊。尽管从那时起微软的营收和每股收益已增长了两倍多，但股价却没能同步上涨。要扭转这个局面，微软其实可以采取一种很简单的做法：实行类似Facebook公司一样明确的战略，收购一批新公司中的佼佼者。

    微软可以通过主导三大领域获得更好的发展前景：操作系统、开发工具和远程会议技术。很显然，现在的软件发展趋势正在转向虚拟化和云计算。云端的基础架构即服务（Cloud IaaS）正在成为开发者的重心所在。据The Cloud Market（亚马逊的EC2完整映像目录——译注）估算，亚马逊公司（Amazon）的“弹性云计算”（Elastic Compute Cloud，EC2）上的应用中，基于Linux的各类应用占90%以上。这种情况表明，很多开发者更倾向于基于Linux系统为云端进行开发。

    由于未能在云端与Linux实现密切整合，微软已流失大量客户。尽管微软声称支持Linux，但亚马逊公司、VMware公司、IBM公司和Salesforce公司等云计算供应商实际上支持力度更大。如果把所有设备考虑在内，包括智能手机、平板电脑（Android操作系统实际也是基于Linux内核开发的），Linux的市场份额大约达到了微软Windows的两倍。我并不是要建议微软放弃Windows——它依然是一款功能丰富的卓越产品，我的意思是，如果实施双系统战略，微软将有机会在以下几方面打开局面：

    • 在智能手机和平板电脑领域获得更大竞争优势

    • 提供一款各类企业的所有应用都可采用的云服务

    • 提供价格实惠的低价服务器

    • 更好地留住企业客户

    要实现上述目标，第一步重大举措就是收购Linux系统供应商红帽企业软件公司（Red Hat）。通过这笔收购，同时将它与微软云平台Azure深入整合，微软就能成为IaaS领域的领导者。除Linux外，红帽还拥有功能强大的Open Stack（Rackspace和NASA共同开发的云计算平台——译注）平台，可以利用开源应用程序接口打造一种创新而强大的服务，取代亚马逊的网络服务。这起并购很快就能产生价值，因为随着微软深入企业Linux的实际工作领域，可使它作为云计算企业在短期内加快发展，同时推动它成为云计算领域的主导企业。

    Microsoft's stock has stagnated as investors have lost faith in the company's plans for its future. After peaking at just under $60 a share in early 2000, Microsoft's stock fell to about $22 later that year and has traded mostly between $25 and $40 a share in the 14 years since then. While revenue and earnings per share have more than tripled since then, the stock price has not followed suit. What Microsoft could do can be answered fairly simply: Take a page out of Facebook's apparent strategy and buy best of breed next generation companies.

    Microsoft can improve its prospects by dominating three areas: Operating systems, development tools and conferencing. It's clear that development is shifting to virtualization and the cloud. Cloud IaaS is becoming the center of gravity for developers. According to The Cloud Market, Linux variants account for over 90% of the applications on Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2). The EC2 data indicates that a large number of developers prefer developing in Linux for the cloud.

    Microsoft (MSFT) is losing many customers by not having a more robust integration with Linux in its cloud. While Microsoft claims to be supportive of Linux, other cloud providers like Amazon (AMZN), VMware (VMW), IBM (IBM) and Salesforce.com (CRM) are actually doing much more to support Linux. If one considers all devices, including smart phones and tablets (the Android Operating System is based on the Linux kernel), Linux's unit share is about twice that of Microsoft Windows. I am not suggesting that Microsoft abandon Windows -- it is still a great product with lots of legs, but I am suggesting that a dual OS strategy would give it an opportunity to:

    • Compete more effectively on smart phones and tablets

    • Have a cloud offering that all companies could consider for every application

    • Offer a lower cost server line that would be appealing

    • Have better retention of its corporate customer base

    A way to put a stake in the ground is to buy Linux provider, Red Hat (RHT). With such an acquisition and its deep integration into Microsoft Azure, Microsoft would be well positioned as a leader in IaaS. In addition to Linux, Red Hat has a strong Open Stack player that could leverage open source application programming interfaces as a disruptive, strong alternative to Amazon Web Services (AWS). Such an acquisition would quickly become accretive as Microsoft's reach into the Enterprise Linux workload could accelerate their short-term growth as a Cloud player and propel them into a dominant leadership position in the cloud.