During the All Things Digital conference that took place in San Diego, the Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer talked about the firm’s failure to buy Yahoo!, despite its offer of $47.5 billion. He clarified:

Look, we made a bid (for Yahoo). The bid was out there for three months. There was a difference between bid and ask. We thought we could well accelerate our business, and were going to be financially disciplined about it…

We walked away. We are still talking with them about a few other ideas. However, we are not re-bidding on the firm. We reserve the right to do so. That’s not on the docket.

Mr Gates concurred to say:

I have been supportive of everything that Steve has done; totally supportive!

When asked as to who between Microsoft or Apple will hit the market first with a new touch screen device, Mr. Ballmer said it was not so much of an issue. He added:

We will sell 290 million PCs and Apple will sell 10 million. They are fantastically successful and so are we and our partners.