[righthand]

Well this is the new Xbox boss, Aska Sharma trying to course correct her own actions after pushing out Phil Spencer (and team). Phil had a deep understanding of the game world about profit margins and how the Xbox is essentially a stake in keeping Microsoft in the minds of consumers, a place in the home. Aska has a shallow understanding and sees only the financials and wanted to increase profits. Now she is burning it all down to try and “reset” and replace people with LLMs to increase profit margins. I imagine she will be pushed out herself end of year or next Spring (2027) once her naïve plan back fires.

[draculero]

Just out of curiosity, I checked her Wikipedia page and this caught my eye:

> Sharma posted in 2026 that she had recently begun playing video games under the gamertag AMRAHSAHSA to "learn and understand" the games industry

Imagine running the Xbox division and only just now picking up a controller.

[Telaneo]

A part of me wants to be generous in interpreting that and say, OK, maybe it's the first time she's playing games semi-seriously in order to understand the capital G Gamer. Surely she's played games before, like say, the Sims, Bejeweled, Mario Kart, or picked up a Nintendo DS or Switch in her lifetime. Heck, even Wii Sports should count here in some capacity. Most people have played games casually in their lifetime by this point.

The other part of me though says that, no, it is in fact pretty possible that she hasn't played any video games of note, other than Wii Sports that one time. And even if she has played games casually, is it really too much to ask to have the person leading the Xbox brand be someone who can press the X button on their controller and not be confused by that?

[ebbi]

It's a publicly listed company. They needed someone without the emotional attachment to 'Gaming', but with business nous, to make the decisions needed to meet her mandate, which is to ultimately increase shareholder value.

A 'Gamer' would have found that more difficult to do.

[omcnoe]

Would we say that about any other industry? Can you run a film studio if you have never watched a film in your life? Can you run a publishing house if you’ve never read a novel?

[ebbi]

I should have been more clear and my initial comment didn't portray the intent: sometimes Good business decisions requires a longer time horizon for the strategy to play out.

But with companies on the stock exchange, Good business practice often comes at the expense of market perception -> share price. And when that happens, there is a lot of pressure on the Board -> CEO to ensure gains are being shown immediately.

So my comment isn't to suggest that a Gamer could be a good person to run the business with good business nous, it's that their experience in the industry would most likely lead them to make decisions that are Good but need a longer horizon, vs immediate impact to satisfy the shareholders.

It happens with any company, and we're starting to see this happen with Apple as well. As their main product lines have started to taper off in growth, they have needed to do things to offset that, often making decisions that are contrary to what Apple would usually stand for or would not have considered, say, 15 years ago.

[rustystump]

Press Q to doubt. There are plenty of biz savvy folks out there who at least gamed in high school or college.

[ebbi]

I should have been more clear and my initial comment didn't portray the intent: sometimes Good business decisions requires a longer time horizon for the strategy to play out. But with companies on the stock exchange, Good business practice often comes at the expense of market perception -> share price. And when that happens, there is a lot of pressure on the Board -> CEO to ensure gains are being shown immediately.

So my comment isn't to suggest that a Gamer could be a good person to run the business with good business nous, it's that their experience in the industry would most likely lead them to make decisions that are Good but need a longer horizon, vs immediate impact to satisfy the shareholders.

It happens with any company, and we're starting to see this happen with Apple as well. As their main product lines have started to taper off in growth, they have needed to do things to offset that, often making decisions that are contrary to what Apple would usually stand for or would not have considered, say, 15 years ago.

[PaulHoule]

There's this little concept of "cultural sensitivity". Given the size of the King thing it would even be fair to have somebody who had a serious Candy Crush habit.

At least they didn't create a fake profile for her the way Elon Musk made one.

I think the "glass cliff" is going to claim another victim.

[tapoxi]

Are you conflating Asha Sharma with Satya Nadella? Asha just joined Xbox, she had no role in any prior decision making.

[righthand]

Asha came from the AI division of Microsoft, she didn’t pop out of nowhere. She is strongly tied to the Microsoft LLM plays.

IMO Phil was very clearly pushed out by “AI will cut costs talk”. No one makes huge investments into acquiring companies and then suddenly retires (after running the division successfully for decades) and none of his underlings were promoted into the role, they all left when he did.

[Jare]

I think Phil was pushed out by the complete failure of his strategic vision when confronted with reality. He had a vision of growth and prestige, and money would follow. I loved his vision in its grandiose and lofty goals, but he completely failed to capture any of the "how to make it happen". It stays a fantasy.

[adamwk]

She’s been in her position for less than 6 months. All of the problems were under Phil, so I don’t understand what you mean by course correcting her own actions

[tomtheelder]

I don't really have an opinion on Sharma since she's very green, but Phil Spencer's tenure was an unmitigated disaster. The strategy of rolling up studios and trying to grow through GamePass both completely backfired, with the studios producing few and generally unsuccessful games, and GamePass failing to convert casual players while demolishing your take from your hardcore players.

Was definitely time for major change at XBOX. Is this the right direction? I have no idea.

[dwroberts]

Don’t know why this is being downvoted because it’s absolutely on the money. She’s a very green exec that is doing the classic “change everything to make it look like I’m doing something” while also not really achieving anything.

The rebrand to ‘XBOX’ is a good example of how they’re already out of ideas

[sethops1]

Maybe they should try pivoting the Xbox into being a TV platform /s

[tcmart14]

And they should make an accessory that is an always on camera! Wait a second.... I think I've seen this one before.....

[rustystump]

We’re going in circles