Microsoft is poised to pull off more surprises over the next few years but its chief executive, Steve Ballmer, is keeping all the details close to his chest for now, refusing to confirm talks of upcoming hardwares from the software giant.

According to Mr Ballmer, Microsoft would not back down on opportunities that it identifies, which is a stance that is line with the company's underway transformation of becoming a "device and services," tech firm.

"It is absolutely clear that there is an innovation opportunity on the scene between hardware and software and that is a scene that must not go unexploited at all by Microsoft," the company CEO was reported by Reuters as saying on Thursday.

In the same road map that Microsoft is now using, the company will continue to collaborate with partner firms with Mr Ballmer strongly hinting that "partners of ours will build the lion's share of all Windows devices over the next five years."

But such arrangements would not stop the company from wielding more influence in how device manufacturers would design the products that they plan to deploy with Windows 8 and its future upgrades or editions, he added.

The company chief also veered away from addressing speculations that after the Surface tablet rollout, Microsoft is already training its eyes on an in-house smartphone.

Mr Ballmer said he is currently preoccupied by the pressing ahead to meet need of the moment - to push up people's awareness of mobile devices that run on the multi-platform Windows, making it attractive for the ecosystem to carve a significant in the smartphone world.

"The challenge is to get 10 per cent of the smartphone market, and then 15 per cent, and then 20 per cent. We aren't trying to get to 60 percent overnight," Smarthouse quoted the Microsoft CEO as saying on Friday.

He expressed confidence that a third smartphone system is set to rise because the two dominant ones, Apple's iOS and Google's Android, are with holes that need to be plugged.

"The ecosystem of the Android is a little bit wild ... conversely, the Apple ecosystem looks highly controlled and ... quite high priced," Mr Ballmer said.

Microsoft would want to fill the gap between Android and iOS and by doing so would hopefully draw consumers and telcos alike to the Windows ecosystem, he added.

"That's kind of the best of both worlds and that's available to us," Mr Ballmer said.