Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said Thursday that the company would not pursue a merger with Yahoo!, an acquisition of Facebook, or anything else that costs billions upon billions of dollars.

The company will pursue an "independent path," Ballmer said at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco, opting to acquire smaller companies in the $50 million to $1 billion range, Reuters reported.

With a $23 billion arsenal, that makes for a lot of potential acquisitions.

While conceding that it is logical for people to speculate about a possible merger deal, Ballmer explained that the deal itself is not logical.

"If at some point it makes sense, maybe then it makes sense. But that's not where we are going. We are driving in an independent direction," Ballmer said.