Former Microsoft CEO Ballmer Insists Windows Phone Needs Android Apps

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella's ongoing big initiative to save Windows Phone won't work, believes Steve Ballmer. The former chief executive, who is also the biggest individual shareholder in the firm, said in an interview with Bloomberg that the struggling mobile operating system needs Android apps to survive.

At company's annual stakeholder meeting, Satya Nadella touted Universal Windows Platform, the company's initiative to let developers quickly turn their desktop apps into their mobile counterpart (and its vice-versa) reusing most of the code, as a feature that benefits Windows Store over rival's app stores.

"The powerful concept of Windows and Windows 10 is that it is one application platform, one store for developers, that then should attract developers to build once and have them run across all the Windows," Nadella said addressing concerns of a disappointed stakeholder who wanted to know why his Windows Phone doesn't have all the apps.

Ballmer in an interview to Bloomberg said that Nadella's big initiative won't work. "That won't work," Ballmer commented. Instead, Microsoft needs to enable Windows Phones "to run Android apps," he added.

Universal Windows Platform runs on the idea of universal apps that exist for both mobile and desktop platforms. But the two-year old initiative led by Nadella, is yet to show any substantial benefits. The program hasn't been able to entice many top apps such as Starbucks, Pocket, Pushbullet, and several of Google's apps and services that still don't exist on Windows Store.

The company announced four Windows Bridge projects this year that were aimed to allow developers to turn their Android, iOS, and Win32 apps into Windows 10 Mobile apps with minimal effort. However, a recent report claimed that the company has put Project Astoria, the porting tool for Android apps, is on hold for an "indefinite" period of time. The development of the iOS porting tool however appears to be on track.

Also during the interview with Bloomberg, Ballmer said that Microsoft should reveal profit margins and sales when reporting cloud earnings, rather than providing just a "run rate" that he called a "bullshit" metric.