[mfieldhouse]

"... the consumer space and enterprise space are connected and become more so. Microsoft needs to be strong in the consumer space to remain strong in the enterprise."

Not at all true. Cisco, Juniper, Oracle, EMC, Netapp are strong in the enterprise with virtually zero consumer presence. Or am I missing something?

[rbanffy]

Microsoft has a positive feedback loop running between its enterprise and consumer operations. Kill one side and the other becomes irrelevant.

[r00fus]

Close. Not exactly irrelevant, but the profit margins will suffer as the failure of overlapping lockin schemes force Microsoft to actually invest and innovate in the area they don't abandon.