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Consumer Electronics

Microsoft (MSFT) Zune: Finally Sold Out

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By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
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Since Microsoft (MSFT) first launched its Zune portable multimedia player over a year ago, there has been no good news. Most research puts it in fourth place in sales among similar devices, way behind the No.1 product, the Apple (AAPL) iPod.

But, recent news is that the relaunched and improved product, which has gotten good reviews, is selling out ahead of the holiday season. According the The Associate Press "the 80-gigabyte Zune media player Microsoft Corp. launched Tuesday has sold out across the Web, to the dismay of online shoppers and delight of the world’s largest software maker."

Microsoft should hardly be delighted. It should be troubled. At the peak of the holiday buying season, with a chance to gain market share from Apple, it is low on inventory. Of course, there is no word that Apple is having similar problems. Their manufacturing controls seem to be a little better.

The "sold out" Zune may make Microsoft fell good, but it is a significant opportunity lost.

Douglas A. McIntyre

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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