With the Financial Times reporting that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer "seemed all but ready to throw in the towel on the Zune mobile device," Microsoft's Zune team stood up for itself in a blog post today.
The post:
There's been a lot of speculation today about some comments made about Zune in the Financial Times ...
... We've been saying for some time that our strategy for Zune is to provide a great entertainment experience across multiple screens and devices. Software and services have always been at the core of this strategy -- this is nothing new. Today, this means a great Zune experience on the PC and portable Zune devices, and as we have said before we think it makes sense to extend that experience to other devices in the future.
The demise of the Zune as a device is premature. In an interview with the P-I, Entertainment and Devices President Robbie Bach acknowledged that "We have already started to see some flattening and even declining in the stand-alone MP3 player market. I think you'll see that continue."
But he also said he did not think the device would go away, at least in the short term.
"I just think it's not going to be where most of the growth is," he said. "We have some great assets in the software we do for the Zune -- both on the PC and on the Zune device -- as well as the services we provide -- Zune Social, Zune Marketplace. We see opportunities for those beyond what we do on the device itself."
I asked Bach if there would still be Zunes, five, ten years from now.
His response: "Who knows. I won't prognosticate."
Source : http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/
