According to the the SEC filing, Ballmer was eligible for a bonus this past year of between 0% and 200% of his base $675,000 salary. He received 100%.

It has only been a few months since Apple's iAds went live, but the service is taking away shares from perennial mobile-advertising leaders Google, Microsoft, and Nokia.

Research firm ComScore reported that of top 5 platforms, only Google Android grew in market share, from 12% to 17% of the US smartphone market in May to July. Microsoft, RIM, and Apple all lost shares, while Palm hovered at 4.9 percent.

Chief Executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo will step down on September 20, and be succeeded by Microsoft Corp.'s Stephen Elop.

Microsoft this week reached the "release to manufacturing" step in the development of its new mobile phone operating system Phone 7.

Microsoft may end up paying $400 million on marketing alone to launch Windows Phone 7 for the holidays, an analyst has said.

Menlo is a prototype mobile device with a capacitive touch screen (4.1-inch diagonal, 800x480) running Microsoft Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R2 which incorporates a Bosch BMA150 3-axis accelerometer and Bosch BMP085 digital pressure sensor (barometer)

ARM, the UK's largest technology company by market value, declined to raise its full-year 2010 outlook in spite of beating market expectations with its first-half results.

"With closer access to the Arm technology we will be able to enhance our R&D activities for ARM-based products," said KD Hallman, general manager, Microsoft.

Windows Phone 7 architect Belfiore talks about the Microsoft vision for mobile phones, how some Kin leftovers might or might not make their way into the platform, and what Microsoft has learned from Apple's iPhone 4 and Android's rapid growth. He also addressed how Microsoft might help grow the Zune Marketplace app library so it can compete with the Apple App Store.

To its credit, Microsoft recognized that its smartphone platform was headed down the wrong path, and it reversed course to deliver a different platform rather than continuing to build incrementally on the foundation laid by Windows Mobile.

NTP has filed a lawsuit against six of the world's leading cell phone makers, accusing them of infringing on its patents for delivering e-mail to handsets.

So just two months after launching the Kin One and Two Microsoft is shutting down the Kin project.

Verizon spokeswoman Brenda Raney said the new pricing is part of a broader set of price reductions. The company is "comfortable" with the way the Kin is being accepted, she said. Katy Asher, a spokeswoman for Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft, declined to comment.

Steve Ballmer was unconcerned that Apple overtook Microsoft as the world's largest technology firm.