Steve Ballmer unveiled his massive reorganization plan for his Redmond Empire, but it seems that the CEO of Microsoft may soon find himself having to deal with an activist investment firm on the company’s board.
ValueAct Capital Management, as you may recall, bought a $2 billion stake in Microsoft in April this year.
And while there was speculation back then that the head of ValueAct, Jeffrey Ubben may mount an effort to get rid of Ballmer as CEO, he said that he had no plans to interfere with future strategies of the technology titan.
But now a new report claims otherwise.
Citing insider sources close to the matter, Reuters claims that ValueAct has begun talks for a seat on the company’s board. What is not clear, however, is whether any major changes are already planned or not.
Word is that investors are not entirely happy seeing Microsoft pushed towards a devices and services concept, and this new strategy is not considered the right away forward for the technology titan.
Neither ValueAct nor Microsoft have as of yet commented on the claims.
But if true, this would nevertheless signal a much more hands-on approach from ValueAct in regards to influencing Microsoft’s future strategy. The report actually comes hot on the heels of the news that Redmond took a one time charge of $900 million because of the price cuts on the Surface RT.
The next year or so in considered vitally important for Microsoft as it the company puts into action Ballmer’s reorganization plan. Either way, the next twelve odd months promises to be rather interesting.
