Ballmer throws
metaphorical punches

Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer has signaled his company's current and future plans to derive significant revenue from advertising, reports The Associated Press.

Ballmer said that within a couple of years, advertising will account for 25 percent of Microsoft's business. Within that time all ad money will be funneled through digital platforms like aQuantive, which Microsoft purchased just months ago.

Despite an increased focus on advertising, Ballmer says Microsoft will continue to be a software company and not merely an entertainment brand. (Recently, Ballmer dubbed Facebook - into which Microsoft may take a minor equity holding - "faddish").

Xbox and other ventures are product executions, he says. But ad spending is where the growth is, and the company's ongoing love affair with online software will be funded by that revenue.