In a November 2016 interview, Ballmer said he and Gates have "drifted apart" ever since, saying that they always had a "brotherly relationship" beforehand. He said that his push into the hardware business, specifically smartphones, which Gates did not support, contributed to their relationship breakdown. Retirement After saying in 2008 that he intended to remain CEO for another decade, Ballmer announced his retirement in 2013, after losing billions of dollars in acquisitions and on the Surface tablet. Microsoft's stock price rebounded on the news. Ballmer says that he regretted the lack of focus on Windows Mobile in the early 2000s, leaving Microsoft a distant third in the (then current) 2013 smartphone market. Moreover, he attributed the success of the expensively-priced iPhones to carrier subsidies. He went on to say, He called the acquisition of the mobile phone division of Nokia his "toughest decision" during his tenure, as it was overseeing the changing profile of Microsoft as it was expanding on hardware. Ballmer hosted his last company meeting in September 2013, and stepped down from the company's board of directors, in August 2014. On December 24, 2014, the Seattle Times reported that the IRS sued Ballmer, Craig Mundie, Jeff Raikes, Jim Allchin, Orlando Ayala and David Guenther in an effort to compel them to testify in Microsoft's corporate tax audit. The IRS has been looking into how Microsoft and other companies deal with transfer pricing. Other positions Ballmer served as director of Accenture Ltd. and a general partner of Accenture SCA from 2001 to 2006. On competing companies and software Apple In 2007, Ballmer said "There's no chance that the [Apple] iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance." Speaking at a conference in NYC in 2009, Ballmer criticized Apple's pricing, saying, "Now I think the tide has turned back the other direction (against Apple). The economy is helpful. Paying an extra $500 for a computer in this environment—same piece of hardware—paying $500 more to get a logo on it? I think that's a more challenging proposition for the average person than it used to be." In 2015, Ballmer called Microsoft's decision to invest in Apple to save it from bankruptcy in 1997 as the "craziest thing we ever did." By 2015, Apple was the world's most valuable company. In 2016, Ballmer did an interview with Bloomberg where Ballmer added context to his iPhone statement, saying "People like