Ballmer Still Searching for an Answer to Google

Microsoft may be the only company in a position to provide "any real competition" for Google in the online search business, CEO Steve Ballmer said Thursday. But first it will need to figure out a way to do it. . . The CEO offered little in the way of new insights during the evening, except that Microsoft will discuss "Project Red Dog," its secretive cloud computing initiative, at the Microsoft Professional Developer Conference next month.