The Steve Ballmer Interview
Steve Ballmer explains the IBM DOS deal structure, why he nearly sold all his Microsoft stock, and how the board rejected his Nokia push then bought Nokia after he quit.
- Ballmer’s net worth grew from $20B to $130B since 2014 solely by holding Microsoft stock — no active investing, just one decision not to sell.
- Around 2015-16 Ballmer came within one conversation of selling his entire Microsoft position for “full emotional detachment” but ultimately held.
- The board rejected Ballmer’s Nokia/hardware push; he resigned partly over the disrespectful process, and the board then bought Nokia anyway after he left.
- Microsoft bought a DOS clone from Seattle Computer Products for ~$49K and licensed it to IBM non-exclusively — the non-exclusivity created the entire platform.
- Gary Kildall’s Digital Research lost the IBM OS deal by refusing to sign IBM’s NDA; IBM mistakenly thought Microsoft could license Digital Research’s CPM.
- Microsoft’s early enterprise licensing ran on an honor system where companies self-reported how many software copies they made — Ballmer called this “astonishing.”
- Andy Grove predicted 100M PCs per year in the 1980s; Ballmer and Gates laughed it off — Ballmer later said they “classically underforecast” the market.
- IBM ended the OS/2 collaboration around 1990 without warning; Ballmer discovered the divorce by reading the Wall Street Journal mid-morning run.
2025-06-02 · Watch on YouTube
