After participating in a panel discussion at TechCrunch Disrupt SF about the enterprise market, Box CEO Aaron Levie said to me in an interview that the industry needs an innovative and more prosperous Microsoft. However, while he writes passionately about Microsoft and its direction, he laughed at the idea of replacing Steve Ballmer.
Levie wrote a blog post in August on TechCrunch about Microsoft’s next era. He wrote forcefully on the topic in such a manner that it almost seemed like he wanted the job. Of course he is not interested in replacing Ballmer but the question, though jokingly, did give Levie some space to talk about why Microsoft is so important to the enterprise ecosystem.
“Surprisingly that was not a job application,” Levie said.
He said that in large part Microsoft’s importance is reflected in the size of the company. There needs to be competition with operating systems and other important technologies that are important to the Internet ecosystem.
In the interview, Levie also touched on security, privacy and the company’s future as an independent company. Check it out in the video at the top of the post.
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