Is Microsoft going to offer bigger discounts to those categories of nations compared with what you might charge an industrialised state?
I was responsible for the Dominican Republic, and the country's president and I flew to Redmond to meet with Steve (Ballmer) and Bill (Gates); and it was interesting because that was a real-life case study for me. We started the discussion with him saying, "I can get all this stuff for free and here's this big American company wanting to charge a bunch of money." And as we began to educate him a little more -- you take 5 percent off the budget but you've increased by an X factor all these other scenarios around training, development and administration -- and at that time it was even more difficult to administrate those environments.
But just to clarify, are you saying that Microsoft will not have an A price and a B price for First World and Third World countries?
No, we have to look at it. There are some challenges there...this challenge of how do you properly value and price software is a tough, tough job. We know we have to be relevant in all these markets and we know we have to be receptive and understanding of market conditions in a variety of ways.
Do you think you'll have decided this by the end of the year?
No. It might not be one big bang thing. But I think that over time we'll begin to do a series of things to work with governments and underdeveloped countries.
Have you run across countries where the feeling is that they are just not going to consider Microsoft because of the larger political context?
I don't know of any government that's said, across the board, they are going to use open source and nothing else. We're spending a very good amount of time with a variety of these governments. At the end of the day, we will be ready to do what they need us to do.
How is Longhorn going to improve your position against Linux?
Actually, I don't look at it that way. You talk to customers and partners and deliver value. It will be our stack versus (Linux's) stack and security and cost and then the value of integration -- Longhorn or not -- that's there.
Is this a reflection of a different culture at Microsoft? You used to be enemy-centric.
Longhorn really should help us outpace other folks from an innovation standpoint, and that's where we're putting a lot of muscle. But we're doing it because this is what customers want to see from us. They want the scenario that we're building.
But every software company says it's providing value to customers. With Linux, you also face the reality that the product is good enough and what's more, it costs nothing.
Customers have accepted the fact that this is not about the acquisition costs. They're more concerned with the 95 percent to 97 percent that goes into things like management and training. That's why I'm not worried at all whether Linux costs less.
If not cost, then what does worry you about Linux?
I'm thinking about how we can tell our story to tell the difference between our stack and their stack. And you know what? It's not about religion anymore. It's not a new thing that you can throw in a Microsoft guy's face and see if he jumps. It's a commercial discussion. People are looking at the total cost of ownership. They are looking at the security model. They're looking at reliability. They are looking at interoperability. They're taking decisions the way they take decisions on mainframes, Unix, Novell and Oracle -- that's where we know how to operate. That's how we really know how to show the value of integrated innovation.
