Bill Gates' right hand man Steve Ballmer has outlined the future of Microsoft as "advertising, advertising, advertising!". Set to run the company when Bill Gates steps down next year the Microsoft junior partner has provided a strong indication as to which direction Microsoft will turn to stay relevant in the rapidly changing technology industry.

The company are currently pushing open-source and online software to compete with its competitors. Microsoft have just released a web based feature for Office that enables the user to edit documents from different computers and share documents. This trend is expected to result in 'web based software' or 'software-as-a-service' taking over from shrink wrapped software within five years. Improving their existing services is only part of the plan.

Ballmer describes Microsoft's desktop and server businesses as adolescent kids, "...they are still developing...They have their whole future ahead of them." The analogy seems to suggest that paternal interest will focus on the younger members of the Microsoft family. Microsoft have just spent an enormous £3billion in acquiring advertising group aQuantive and are rumoured to be attempting to buy a stake in social networking site Facebook. These moves demonstrate the company is looking to the future and that the future of the industry is in advertising.

The fact that Microsoft are moving toward exploiting the online advertising market is yet another indicator that the future for High Position remains good. With the industry heavyweight investing its future in advertising the industry will expect to benefit from further driving growth. Ballmer has been quick to recognise that in 'the brave new world of Google'...advertising is King.