( CNN ) -- Microsoft 's revenue has been growing -- slowly , but growing . Profits have been growing faster than revenue , as the company clamps down on expenses . The company 's core business software like Office 2010 has been showing great results for more than a year now , and the Xbox had its best holiday season ever , as Microsoft sold a million in a single day after Thanksgiving . Plus , it 's got more than $ 50 billion in cash . So why has the company 's stock stubbornly refused to move for the last decade ? Why do big investors keep calling for CEO Steve Ballmer 's head ? The problem comes down to a simple statistic that should scare the heck out of Microsoft and its investors : . Five years ago , 95 % of devices connected to the Internet were Windows PCs . Right now , less than 80 % are , and some folks expect the number to drop below 20 % in a few years . That 's a historic shift , and is just one of many signals that the personal computer is no longer dominant in the ever-shifting world of consumer technology . Credit the explosion in smartphones , led by Apple 's iPhone and a bunch of other phones running Google 's Android ( which is more popular than the iPhone by sheer numbers ) . Apple 's iPad has also made a big dent , taking up the equivalent to about 10 % of the PC market -- and it 's less than 2 years old . Microsoft is nowhere in the worlds of smartphones or tablets . But this year , the company hopes to change all that . Next month , the company will let the masses download and test a not-quite-finished version of Windows 8 , which Ballmer has called the most important product in company history . Windows 8 is going to be a little bit all over the place . On the surface , it will have a cool , modern look and feel that 's meant to be used with touchscreen tablets . Call it an iPad killer if you will . It 's cutting edge and friendly , filled with bright , colorful squares and sliding screens , and it 's going to have a lot of features that will be familiar to iPhone and iPad users , like an app store . If you buy a Windows tablet , that 's probably what you 're going to see and use most of the time . But Windows 8 will also run on regular old PCs , and underneath the new tablet-friendly interface , it will look and feel a lot like the old version of Windows . If you 're using a desktop PC or laptop PC at work , you 'll probably end up using the old interface . It 's a tricky balancing act to pull off , and lots could go wrong -- for instance , it 's not exactly clear how smooth it will be to switch between the two types of Windows , or if you 'll even be able to get the old Windows on certain types of tablets ( that is , tablets that run the power-efficient ARM processors used by the iPad and most other tablets today ) . But if past Windows launches are any guide , Microsoft will help its cause by spending hundreds of millions of dollars on high-profile TV ads , viral whisper campaigns and `` co-marketing '' money for its PC hardware partners and the resellers who push Microsoft software to big corporations . But Windows 8 is only half the equation . Microsoft came out with a surprisingly good smartphone platform way back in fall 2010 -- in some ways , it was better than the iPhone from the moment it launched . But for a variety of reasons -- including mediocre phones that run the operating system , lack of support from big carriers like Verizon and some big gaps with features and apps -- it flopped . A year later , Microsoft 's Windows Phone platform is still at less than 2 % market share , way behind Apple , Android and even the struggling BlackBerry . But this year , Microsoft has teamed up with Nokia , the biggest cell phone maker in the world , to push a new line of Windows Phones . Its flagship phone , the Lumia 900 , has received universally great reviews -- almost like the kinds of reviews the iPhone got when it came out . Equally important , Microsoft has committed hundreds of millions of dollars to marketing these new phones , including paying commissions to staffers at retail stores . That 's critically important , as a lot of retail store clerks did n't even know what a Windows Phone was last year . Windows 8 . Windows Phone . Expect Microsoft to push those products like its future depends on them . Because it does . Copyright © 2011 Business Insider .
Microsoft is nowhere in smartphones or tablets , but the company hopes to change that . Next year , users will be able to download and install a not - quite - finished version of Windows 10 . Microsoft has teamed up with Nokia , the biggest mobile phone maker in the world .