Apple passes Microsoft as world's biggest tech co.

[Sanjin Jukic]

Apple passes Microsoft as world's biggest tech co.

SEATTLE – Apple has surpassed Microsoft as the largest technology company in the world by market capitalization.

Apple's move comes as the company's iPhone, and now its iPad tablet computer, have taken on more of the personal computing tasks once handled by computers running Microsoft's Windows operating system and other programs.

Market cap is the dollar value of a company's outstanding shares. On Wednesday, Apple Inc.'s shares slipped $1.11 to close at $244.11, making its market cap about $222 billion.

But Microsoft Corp.'s stock fell $1.06, or 4.1 percent, to close at $25.01, for market cap of about $219 billion.

The only U.S. business with a higher market value is Exxon Mobil Corp. The oil company's market cap is about $279 billion, based on Wednesday's closing price of $59.31.

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[michael zaletel]

Read that earlier and thought about buying Microsoft stock.

I'm impressed by how they finally handled that "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" thing with "I'm a PC and Windows 7 was my idea" Brilliant!

-michael zaletel

 

[Kwan Khan]

anxiously awaiting steve to publish a paper titled "Thoughts on Exxon Mobil". Just Jokin..:laugh:

People love investing in Apple though because they are forward thinking. Microsoft has been stagnant in innovation....though they display some awesome stuff they rarely take it to market. It is good to work at where both companies compete and here there has been winners and losers:

I think Apple has beat them in Media Players, Phones and Retail.
Microsoft continues to trounce Apple in desktop productivity software sales and desktop web browser installed base.

Then there are the areas the companies don't compete:
Microsoft has beaten Apple in operating system licences, because Apple doesn't compete.
Microsoft has beaten Apple games consoles, because Apple doesn't compete.

BUT:
Apple has beaten Microsoft in computer sales, because Microsoft doesn't compete.

 

[Michael McLaughlin]

Great...

Great...

Now where is my new 64 bit Final Cut Pro.

:closedeyes:

 

[Cüneyt Kaya]

Now where is my new 64 bit Final Cut Pro.

:closedeyes:

on iphone 4g ?

 

[Vico Martin]

Wish apple don´t forget the pros market, will see.

 

[Gavin Greenwalt]

Apple is about to peak.

Android is about to start thrashing iPhone and iPad. Microsoft is about to finally re-enter the smartphone market after creating it 10 years ago.

GoogleTV and MediaCenter aren't even in the same league as AppleTV which is a joke.

Adobe is on a roll with their software development and has an enormous R&D department now working in tandem with University of Washington just cranking out SIGGRAPH papers. The Foundry has finished off the last remnants of Shake.

Windows 7 is at worst comparable to OSX.

White is tired. Unibody aluminum isn't far behind.

Zunepass is head an shoulders above iTunes.

There aren't any more obvious Geek Toys which can be popularized. The next 'thing' is going to be movies and TV streaming. I can always tell what Apple's next move is going to be since it's always what's popular but awkward right now. This, though isn't going to be the unfair trouncing Apple is used to delivering. This is an area that the Xbox, PS3, Roku and Tivo are actually very effective at. MediaCenter, Mediaroom and GoogleTV are serious contenders.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Looks like Apple decided to take a position which includes high figures and a lot of stuff not working properly.

 

[Stephen Gentle]

Android is about to start thrashing iPhone and iPad. Microsoft is about to finally re-enter the smartphone market after creating it 10 years ago.

Microsoft has nothing now. There is a pretty big rival going on between Google and Apple at the moment, and I expect that by the time Windows Phone is released, it will be so far behind iPhone and Android that it will remain a very minor player...

Adobe is on a roll with their software development and has an enormous R&D department now working in tandem with University of Washington just cranking out SIGGRAPH papers. The Foundry has finished off the last remnants of Shake.

What does this have to do with Apple? Having a lot of software available on Apple's platforms is good for their core business (making hardware).

And if anything a bit of competition between Adobe and Apple in the media creation realm will be a good thing...

Windows 7 is at worst comparable to OSX.

White is tired. Unibody aluminum isn't far behind.

I'm not a fan of the white, but I've never seen any computers better looking than than the Mac Pro, iMac and Macbook lines...

 

[Erik Franzén]

Well, yes. But they still lack quite a bit of the punch Microsoft has been giving in the console market (XBOX 360) and the love developers and indies have been handed by Microsoft. Apple? They pretty much punch developers in the face left and right and don't give a damn.

Never seen that side from Microsoft in the last couple of years, they've just been upping their game. Maybe not inventive for the consumer, but hell yeah when it comes to developers. And in the long run, that can mean quite a bit...

 

[Stephen Gentle]

Well, yes. But they still lack quite a bit of the punch Microsoft has been giving in the console market (XBOX 360) and the love developers and indies have been handed by Microsoft. Apple? They pretty much punch developers in the face left and right and don't give a damn.

Are you joking? Windows development is absolutely horrible, especially when compared to Apple's Cocoa (possibly the best API I've used) and even against open source solutions like Qt and Gtk!

Apple actually cares about developers at least as much as Microsoft do. But Apple cares about its platforms and its users a lot too, which I think Microsoft doesn't so much.

For example, Flash is easy to develop for, but all in all it's bad for the platform and the users. Applications written in Flash will be slower, will probably crash more often than native applications, use far more resources (which means more power consumption and less battery life), and have worse UI consistency to other applications. Then there's the fact that Apple wants to be able to keep their platform the best they can - if a much better mobile processor that's not ARM based comes out, developers who write native apps will be able to compile the new version by checking a check box before the new phone was released. Developers of Flash applications would have to wait months for Adobe to port their compiler to target the new platform. And, given how Adobe took more than a year to port their creative suite apps to Intel on Mac OS X, and then made users pay for the next version to go native, I wouldn't be surprised if they made developers pay to upgrade in that situation as well.

In the long term, I think Apple's strategy is really better for users and developers.

 

[Erik Franzén]

Are you joking? Windows development is absolutely horrible, especially when compared to Apple's Cocoa (possibly the best API I've used) and even against open source solutions like Qt and Gtk!

Apple actually cares about developers at least as much as Microsoft do. But Apple cares about its platforms and its users a lot too, which I think Microsoft doesn't so much.

For example, Flash is easy to develop for, but all in all it's bad for the platform and the users. Applications written in Flash will be slower, will probably crash more often than native applications, use far more resources (which means more power consumption and less battery life), and have worse UI consistency to other applications. Then there's the fact that Apple wants to be able to keep their platform the best they can - if a much better mobile processor that's not ARM based comes out, developers who write native apps will be able to compile the new version by checking a check box before the new phone was released. Developers of Flash applications would have to wait months for Adobe to port their compiler to target the new platform. And, given how Adobe took more than a year to port their creative suite apps to Intel on Mac OS X, and then made users pay for the next version to go native, I wouldn't be surprised if they made developers pay to upgrade in that situation as well.

In the long term, I think Apple's strategy is really better for users and developers.

No I wasn't. And please respect the opinion of others even if you care nothing for it.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Microsoft has nothing now. There is a pretty big rival going on between Google and Apple at the moment, and I expect that by the time Windows Phone is released, it will be so far behind iPhone and Android that it will remain a very minor player...

Yep. And I suppose that's why the next release of the MS Visual Studio and related developer tools will be able to officially create iPhone apps and they have much increased, and directly incorporated support, for Android as well. Oh wait, was I supposed to say that...?

To me, Apple seems to be in the same position Microsoft was in about 18 years ago. They're king of the hill and the anti-trust litigation, most of it unfounded and frivolous, is starting to fly at them at an alarming rate. I don't really know if Apple wants to be the leader of the pack here. I truly believe that Jobs just wants to do his thing and produce the best products to fit the markets he enters. Then again, I always thought that of Bill Gates.

As for the white being over and unibody aluminum not far behind, I have to disagree somewhat. There is nothing I hate more than cheap, bulky, plastic construction. I cringe when I pick up most PC notebook systems. OTOH, Apple's sleek unibody design, is both wonderful and far too restrictive. I'm really hoping the next trend will be darkly-colored anodized aluminum and I would like to see more quality aluminum construction from PC makers. It's more environmentally friendly in terms of both manufacturing and disposal and easier to recycle than ABS and other plastics laced with metal parts.

...I never liked white. Give me black, anodized aluminum. Unibody notebook construction is a fine thing, but please design enough space inside the thing so there's room to accommodate variations to the components inside. In case no one noticed, the unibody design of the Macbook Pro kinda bit Apple in the ass for this last round of updates. They could increase the thickness of the 17" MBP by 0.2" and no one would care. It would still be the thinnest 17" out there and they could reshape the battery to allow room for other things. Oh, then we could put a 1TB 12mm high HDD or 760GB SSD into the thing too.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Apple? They pretty much punch developers in the face left and right and don't give a damn.

You obviously don't develop for any Apple platform. I'm curious as to what you're actually talking about here. Care to elaborate? Sounds more like the typical FUD that keeps being cycled by Google and the Android crowd since competition has heated up.

I agree that Microsoft has stepped up their game, but so has Apple on the development front. It's kinda hard to compare anything Apple with the Xbox platform as Apple has nothing like it. I guess there's AppleTV, but for all intents and purposes, it seems like an abandoned platform. I don't think it evolved into what Jobs or Apple envisioned for it, so I'm expecting something better to come along to replace it. But I don't think we'll see it until after Google makes their move with GoogleTV.

 

[Erik Franzén]

I am hugely biased, but I was in the storm when THIS shit hit the fan. Not fun. At all.
Contrast that with never having any problems with Microsoft's XNA Indie Game channel and you can see where I am coming from. But don't say it's FUD, that's fucking offensive to the people who got hit by similar shit.

Whatever, this discussion won't go anywhere nice so count me out. I just wanted to clarify that Apple has and can do some pretty amazingly stupid stuff when it comes to their app store -- and it has zero to do with maintaining "a high quality standard". iFart anyone? >.>

EDIT: and no, I am not intending to offend, flame or bash anyone here. This is just my experience with Apple, which I've already admitted is colored and quite frankly -- I am pissed off by the attitude they displayed in a few particular instances when either myself or friends got burnt. Comparing that with what I've got from other companies, it just doesn't compare. So sorry to anyone who had better experiences, but I am staying the hell away from ever developing anything with Apple again. It just doesn't compute.

 

[Danish P.V.]

I like my Ipod Touch - but nearly anything else from Apple sucks. I hate the Mac Pro at work when I have to switch from my Windows 7 machine. So far Macs caused us more trouble than needed...

 

[Doug Pasley]

I wouldn't read too much into market capitalization . . . . it changes all the time. The question is, if either one disappeared from the face of the earth today, which one would the world miss the most?

 

[Michael Hastings]

People love investing in Apple though because they are forward thinking. Microsoft has been stagnant in innovation....though they display some awesome stuff they rarely take it to market. It is good to work at where both companies compete and here there has been winners and losers:

Computer sales are up as more and more people with iphones and ipods and ipads become more open to buying Apple computers. Iphones sales look to be solid and solid growth for a couple years as does the ipad. Ipods will drop some but still the market leader. Add in apple software, and music, video and now print content and you have a growing, well diversified major company.

I think people invest in apple because they see a solid cashflow and profit stream.

 

[Michael Totten]

Apple is about to peak.

Android is about to start thrashing iPhone and iPad. Microsoft is about to finally re-enter the smartphone market after creating it 10 years ago.

GoogleTV and MediaCenter aren't even in the same league as AppleTV which is a joke.

Apple Peaking:
IMO they're just still gaining momentum & most analysts are counting on the stock going well north of $300 per share. Fast forward to the 25 brick and mortar Apple Stores about to open in China. (The Chinese market hasn't even been touched yet)... and according to what I've read they're loving it. That's 1.5 billion people. So I think it's going to be hard to tell when Apple might start leveling off for at least another year or so.


iphone:

Well let's wait and see what Apple delivers in a few weeks. I'm pretty sure the iphone 4g is going to be a huge update... furthermore if they can seal the deal with Verizon, well it's going to be good & I really doubt Jobs is losing to much sleep over iphone sales.

As far as Apple TV:

I have an AppleTV and use it all the time. I agree, currently it's not up to snuff and Apple admitted that it was more of a "hobby" as Jobs put it... but there is more to the story. The current AppleTV is just a pilot or beta of sorts.

Apple is currently building a 1 BILLION dollar super computer/server and just recently purchased LaLa. If you put 2 & 2 together it's not hard to figure out that in the not to distant future Apple TV and iTunes is going to be on a whole new level.

I'm guessing that it won't matter how big the drive is on your laptop, desktop, iphone, ipod, ipad or AppleTV... and this is because most everything is going to be streamed. Anything you've got stored on your drive in your iTunes will now be available to you anytime on any device. With 4G right around the corner and wifi getting faster I think this is where everything is going. AppleTV is soon to get a huge facelift and user interface over haul.

Another thing GoogleTV doesn't even exist yet.

 

[Imran Farouk]

Android is beautiful and all but keep in mind it was in a way what Google took away from their relationship with Apple, as was everything else Google is in a way building now, Google TV - Apple TV. The difference was that they took time and said 'hmm well whats wrong with this' and then off the board took all those 'whats wrong' and made a product that is what seems to be seemingly continuously improving.

Android:
Wait till 7th, for Apple this will be in a sense, the last stand off kind a thing in the sense whereby Android has thrown so many blows at Apple, it's either Apple get back up and go "right" and do a K.O to Android for the next year (assuming next iPhone is still June revision) or Apple are now stuck in the mud due to all the press and in a way being all over. I don't think Apple has ever had such a bad leak ahead of a product launch as the iPhone 4G, if that is indeed the one to be launched, I'm not sure how they will come out singing as iPhone 4.0 software has been out, no doubt Google has seen it, analyzed it, iPhone 4G has been out, Google are clearly going "hmm ok" and are preparing something to smash it. There's a ton of this that can be said as it is all 'baseless facts' but take a look at the whole situation and it's really just a stand off between the two and Microsoft can't seriously compete, why? Because they would need to revamp everything, which granted the new mobile platform is, yet once again it comes down to your hardware, the Nexus One and iPhone are both seriously sleek phones in many respects, I don't know many Windows Mobile phones that are or have been as sleek, I've owned a few myself and have always just gone back to Nokia because they were just easier to handle, then iPhone came and that was it, everything else other then a G phone seems like a toy.

Apple TV was suppose to be a hobby, they've let it slip, I'm pretty sure Jobs has seen this and seeing how the man has some what improved a lot since his been around, I doubt his going to let a guy walk off his board and sweep him right off his feet just like that. Jobs, though obviously don't know him personally, as far as talks and reports go, is a guy that doesn't let go easily or fights back hard. Hence the Apple we see today compared to many years ago. Apple TV like some have said, just wait for the whole dust to settle at Apple, lots of things going on, building of a new cloud centre (or what many guess it to be) and then LaLa as well as the ad service etc. I mean it's not too much of a leap to see them retooling and taking a serious look at Apple TV. I'm sure a company will want every product flying out the door like the iPad/iPods were at one point right? Though Apples model appears to be hook with the lower products and then seller the bigger ones, Apple TV would definitely come into the category of a lower product that would be a great hook.

Final Cut 64 Bit... this a seriously totally out of the air kind of remark but I doubt it'll be this year but I'm sure next year at the most and it'll be an epic revision, the last one was a bit of a half stage revision. It better be an epic one anyway since they seem to love it up that their software is used and loved quite a bit in the professional realm even with the other, what would be, seemingly more expensive stuff, given what would I know since Final Cut is all I've ever known, so maybe wrong here!


The only problem I have with Apple now is that, they seem to have forgotten their roots in some ways, you still need a Mac to make the iPhone/iPad work, how else do you develop for it? So surely pushing the Mac forward is definitely to be done with their pushing the iPhone software etc. forward, yet it seems one appears to be lagging behind in a way. I think they've taken down the design award for mac apps and replaced with mobile apps, don't know why they just don't do both, http://developer.apple.com/wwdc/ada/index.html


EDIT:
Apple TV
http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/28/the-next-apple-tv-revealed-cloud-storage-and-iphone-os-on-tap/

Mac Pro, iTunes.com etc.
http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/...pro-and-macbook-air-refreshes-and-itunes-com/