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What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

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Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#11

Post by symesc »

encoderer wrote: post #2

What happens? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

What happens to the companies themselves? Nothing.

What happens to perceptions? Probably something.

There's always mistrust of the biggest player. If Apple become's the most valuable technology company in the world, their propensity to control their stack will be even more a focus for the media.

I think Microsoft will relish being an underdog for a change: "Clearly we're not a monopoly. We're not even the biggest technology company in the world."

Even if both companies change nothing, they will be seen differently.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#12

Post by Nelson69 »

ewanmcteagle wrote: post #8

This comes up a lot but it always misses one aspect of this. Microsoft has returned many many billions to shareholders and continues to do so with a quarterly dividend. When they started along this dividend path they made a large special dividend payment to shareholders. This makes these kinds of comparisons very difficult and of questionable meaning. One of the reasons companies like Apple don't want to pay out a di…

You don't really have to pay a dividend when you're stock is rising like Apple's is on growth. It's a fairly new thing for MS to pay one too and it's only because the growth ended. Since MSFT started issuing a dividend, Apple's stock has gone up over 1000% the dividend doesn't compare.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#13

Post by jakarta »

stcredzero wrote: post #7

What most people don't realize is that while Apple claims to be a mobile device company, the truth is that Apple is really a mobile ecosystem company. It's the ecosystem which is the key! The seamless iTunes/iPod experience was built on the foundation of a workable, legal, profitable music download ecosystem. Apple then leveraged this into the iTunes/AppStore/iPhone mobile device ecosystem. Remember the lessons of th…

I agree - Apple has a tendency to create good devices and then services around the devices.

iPod:iTurnes iPhone:App Store

These services are great because they act as monopolies: "You want to make something for the device? You have to sell it in our store where we take a cut."

So far this has worked quite well and I imagine the returns on capital are huge.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#14

Post by stcredzero »

ewanmcteagle wrote: post #8

This comes up a lot but it always misses one aspect of this. Microsoft has returned many many billions to shareholders and continues to do so with a quarterly dividend. When they started along this dividend path they made a large special dividend payment to shareholders. This makes these kinds of comparisons very difficult and of questionable meaning. One of the reasons companies like Apple don't want to pay out a di…

Microsoft stumbled into riding a thriving software ecosystem with MSDOS and IBM PCs. They were able to leverage that into another thriving ecosystem with Windows. They did the same with the XBox.

A lot of Microsoft's recent attempts in the mobile world have fizzled. Apple understands such ecosystems, however. WinPho 7 will succeed or fail based on whether or not they get their ecosystem right.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#15

Post by daleharvey »

jasonneal wrote: post #9

I find one thing a bit unbelievable. The author says Chrome OS is meant to kill Windows. I don't believe Chrome OS is meant to kill Windows...From what I read it is more of a new style of platform developed for Netbooks and less powerful devices. There is no way that something like that could kill Windows in my opinion. Aside from that, I really don't believe the anything happens when Apple passes Microsoft. Some of…

I would suggest reading innovators dilemma, todays "less powerful devices" can very quickly become what everyone is using tomorrow.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#16

Post by josephd »

Apple still has to contend with Nokia for the largest mobile computing firm slot, as far as it concerns mobile phones. Granted, Apple has the larger profit because of its iTunes/Apps ecosystem which enables the iPhone, but Nokia still has the larger sales numbers and is working hard to build its ecosytem with its new Maemo OS. I also find WinPhone 7's concept of ''hubs'' radically innovative and superior to the the apps concept. In other words, no one is sitting still...

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#17

Post by ratsbane »

daleharvey wrote: post #15
jasonneal wrote: post #9

I find one thing a bit unbelievable. The author says Chrome OS is meant to kill Windows. I don't believe Chrome OS is meant to kill Windows...From what I read it is more of a new style of platform developed for Netbooks and less powerful devices. There is no way that something like that could kill Windows in my opinion. Aside from that, I really don't believe the anything happens when Apple passes Microsoft. Some of…

I would suggest reading innovators dilemma, todays "less powerful devices" can very quickly become what everyone is using tomorrow.

It's more likely that Windows, when it finally does die, won't die because of a single product like Chrome. Rather it will die slowly of a thousand cuts.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#18

Post by rue »

Nelson69 wrote: post #12
ewanmcteagle wrote: post #8

This comes up a lot but it always misses one aspect of this. Microsoft has returned many many billions to shareholders and continues to do so with a quarterly dividend. When they started along this dividend path they made a large special dividend payment to shareholders. This makes these kinds of comparisons very difficult and of questionable meaning. One of the reasons companies like Apple don't want to pay out a di…

You don't really have to pay a dividend when you're stock is rising like Apple's is on growth. It's a fairly new thing for MS to pay one too and it's only because the growth ended. Since MSFT started issuing a dividend, Apple's stock has gone up over 1000% the dividend doesn't compare.

Correct, because stocks are a thing in themselves and not something related to the actual or expected value of the company.

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#19

Post by qeorge »

grellas wrote: post #4

Cisco held the title of "world's most valuable company" at one point during the bubble (see http://news.cnet.com/2100-1033-238483.html - March 27, 2000). That proved pretty meaningless then, as it would for Apple now. Market cap is not a good basis upon which a company should frame its strategic planning and for the article to suggest that Microsoft may do this vis-a-vis Apple and Google renders its analysis pretty s…

Good point. Volkswagen did as well, during the kerfuffle with Porsche in 2008:

http://www.autoblog.com/2008/10/28/volkswagen-temporarily-be...

Re: What Happens When Apple Passes Microsoft In Value? Yes, When.

#20

Post by xtho »

mixmax wrote: post #5

Apple's elephant in the room is Steve Jobs. He's undoubtedly one of the greatest, if not the greatest business leader of the twentieth century, and a lot of Apple's fortunes can directly be ascribed to him being at the helm of the company. It's uncertain what will happen when he passes the torch along, voluntarily or otherwise. There are ongoing concerns about his health, he has had a liver transplant, he's had cance…

Do you think that Apple would have survived without the "Sculley period"?
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