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By Ina Fried, 7 July 2004 08:45

NEWS Microsoft needs to do a better job of convincing customers that the latest versions of its products are worth having. That's the critical opinion of Microsoft's own CEO Steve Ballmer.

In a company-wide email Ballmer said one way to make Microsoft products more useful is to offer more tailored versions of its main products. The company has already expanded the number of versions of Office and is also working to offer more specialised versions of Windows Server, such as a forthcoming version for high-end computing.

"We must also work to change a number of customer perceptions, including the views that older versions of Office and Windows are good enough, and that Microsoft is not sufficiently focused on security," Ballmer wrote in a wide-ranging memo to employees, a missive that has become something of an annual tradition as Microsoft starts its new fiscal year. In the memo, Ballmer also addresses employee morale issues, competition with Linux and the long road to Longhorn, the next version of Windows.

"We have a lot of hard work yet to do on Longhorn to deliver the right capability," Ballmer wrote in the email, noting that the company has pushed back Longhorn and moved forward other products "so we can take the time to get it right."

"Longhorn is a significant step forward, and between now and then we have Tablet, digital media, security innovations in Windows XP SP2, and new Office capabilities to amaze customers," Ballmer wrote. It is not clear whether Ballmer meant that an entirely new version of Office would come before Longhorn, though there is a reference later in the memo to Office 12 - the next version. Microsoft has previously said that a new version of Office that would take advantage of the new operating system was planned for the same time frame as Longhorn. A company representative declined to elaborate on Ballmer's remarks.

Ina Fried writes for News.com