When Microsoft announced that Steve Ballmer will be stepping down as the Chief Executive, it probably did not expect some very big plans from one of the candidates for the position.

Stephen Elop, former Nokia CEO, greeted the whole world with surprising rumours, as supposed news of his plans if he were to become the next head of Microsoft were revealed. Besides, what's more surprising than announcing the plans of selling off or shutting down the Xbox One division? And there are also the plans for killing Bing, while he's at it.

And is plans for the company, if chose, include focusing Microsoft's powers to maximizing Office instead of using it on Windows-based devices, reports Tom's Hardware. All of this is said to be done in order to bring up the fiscal earnings to as much as 40% once the two search engine and game console has been sold off.

A rational decision or a rash one?

It seems that, for the most part, people are just reeled back by the fact that Elop is planning a very big move considering that the Xbox One has just launched and experiencing a pretty good reception as an upcoming next-gen console. It's like cutting off a still-valuable arm that has a lot of potential for growth in the next coming years.

But what some people forget is that other names in Microsoft have also considered the idea before Elop has. For example, The Verge reports that Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, has also considered the idea of splitting the Xbox business, as they deviate from the focus of the company.

But for what it's worth, the splitting of the business or the sale of it may not happen anytime soon. Contemplations based on latter years have shown that the decision to retain it has won over time and again, and the path that Microsoft is on right now is still contributing greatly to the company.

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Fans react on Elop's rumoured plans

Though the news of Xbox being sold off and Bing shutting down are mostly rumours of Elop's plans, fans have already taken to Reddit to discuss their views on what this may mean for the two brands.

For the most part, most of the Redditors believe that this is an impossible situation at best. "It's really uncharted territory for a big selling console brand," said Drakengard. "What does it mean for Xbox? Well, it means a potential personality reset. It is also unlikely that the new company has nearly as much money backing it as it does currently at Microsoft."

"Why would any CEO in their right mind opt to sell off a division that has finally begun to turn a profit?" said SercerferTheUntamed.

"Depends entirely on who buys them [Xbox One]. It wouldn't be surprising to see the brand shrivel and die in the wrong hands or be taken in a new direction in the right ones. I'd welcome some kind of merger between Xbox and PlayStation, the divide just seems silly at this point," said SonoPritch.

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As for the idea of killing off Bing, there is a mix of funny and speculative opinions milling around in Reddit.

"I've been using Bing more and more now. Google search sometimes suddenly refuses to leave my search query alone and searches instead for what it mistakenly thinks I want. Quotes don't help. The same query in Bing often finds what I'm looking for because it doesn't find back," said JasonYamel.

"To be fair, these are two businesses at Microsoft which are hemorrhaging money. While they may have other ancillary benefits, I think it is fair for a company to look at parts of its business which are in the red and decide to cut its losses. That being said, I think selling the Xbox business would be a mistake," said tyree731.

And commenting on a somewhat true feature of Bing is kernelhappy, "Unfortunately for MS, aside from being really efficient at searching for porn, Bing has not provided anything significantly better than Google search. It's failed to capitalize or get in on any trends and it continues to be an also-ran that mostly relies on users who don't know they can change their start page on their computer."

For what it's worth, it might be a short 10 months until Ballmer finally steps down, but hopefully, this gets resolved with both sides--the company and the fanbase of the two businesses in potential danger--being taken into consideration.

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