Steve Ballmer steps down from Microsoft board

Steve Ballmer, the CEO of Microsoft until six months ago, is stepping down from the company’s board of directors. Ballmer says he has faith in the company, but has too little time to be a board member for any longer.

Ballmer announced his decision in an open letter to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, which has been published on Microsoft’s site. The former CEO, who resigned about six months ago, says he has confidence in the future of the company.

Partly because of this, and because of all the new obligations he now has, it would be “impractical” to remain a member of the board of directors, Ballmer writes. The former CEO teaches, among other things, and is now the owner of the LA Clippers basketball team. In the letter, Ballmer, the largest shareholder of Microsoft, writes that he will keep his shares. He also writes that his love for Microsoft is still undiminished after 34 years.

Ballmer resigned as CEO of Microsoft about six months ago. He was replaced by Satya Nadella, who led the cloud & enterprise branch in recent years.