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I thank you both for a great thread of responses. I don't think the IBM PC pushed Apple out of enterprise sales. Apple didn't want to go into those places. St

I thank you both for a great thread of responses. I don't think the IBM PC pushed Apple out of enterprise sales. Apple didn't want to go into those places. Steve Jobs was fired by the board of directors at Apple because (among other things) was going to screw up any corporate deals that Apple might wish to pursue. I haven't any direct evidence, but I managed a medium sized corporate network of Macintosh computers in early 1990s. Their attempts at telling a coherent story for business systems was a bit of reality distortion field, Sculley-style. Ironically, their network server play was a partnership with IBM, rebadged RS/6000 crates. So hmm, maybe sufficiently counter factual to play in this alternate reality -- but I think it would be more likely in business systems to see network of workstations from Sun or Apollo take some wins. DEC VAX servers, oh boy!

TMWNN 5y ago
>I don't think the IBM PC pushed Apple out of enterprise sales. Apple didn't want to go into those places. Apple absolutely did want to go into those places. But not at first. Apple began in 1977 by aiming at the hobbyist market; basically, people like Jobs and Woz's fellow members of the Homebrew Computer Club. (Despite selling electronics parts, Radio Shack always aimed—or, at least, claimed to aim—at small businesses with TRS-80.) VisiCalc came out of nowhere and suddenly made the Apple II—the only platform it ran on for its first 12 months, because Disk II was a ridiculously better floppy system than any other home computer—a business machine. While corporate IT buyers never made bulk purchases, and Apple never built up a corporate sales force, the II appeared on a lot of desks as people saw what VisiCalc could do and rushed out to buy it with their own money or departmental funds. Apple's intention with the Apple III in 1980 was to offer the successor to the II that would fix all of its faults regarding the business market, such as lack of native 80-column displays, lowercase, numeric keypad, more RAM, and larger storage. The III was a bust, though, and people kept buying the II. The PC in 1981 destroyed the already anemic III sales, and completely ended corporate II sales. >I haven't any direct evidence, but I managed a medium sized corporate network of Macintosh computers in early 1990s. Their attempts at telling a coherent story for business systems was a bit of reality distortion field, Sculley-style. Ironically, their network server play was a partnership with IBM, rebadged RS/6000 crates. Completely different world. By that time Apple had long since given up directly competing with PCs and clones in the mainstream corporate market, and focused on the areas it remained strong in: Graphic design, publishing, and other "creative" markets. The Apple-branded network servers were one of the brief times it tried to widen enterprise sales; Xserve is another example. >So hmm, maybe sufficiently counter factual to play in this alternate reality -- but I think it would be more likely in business systems to see network of workstations from Sun or Apollo take some wins. Yes, that's something I could have mentioned in my list of alternate paths. Not Sun or Apollo workstations on every desk—far too expensive—but after 1985 or so X Window or NeWS boxes on every desk is viable, and then perhaps something like Sun Ray. We could have had in 1995 everyone being able to walk up to any terminal at work, put in a smart card, and have their current desktop appear.

TMWNN 5y ago

>I don't think the IBM PC pushed Apple out of enterprise sales. Apple didn't want to go into those places. Apple absolutely did want to go into those places. But not at first. Apple began in 1977 by aiming at the hobbyist market; basically, people like Jobs and Woz's fellow members of the Homebrew Computer Club. (Despite selling electronics parts, Radio Shack always aimed—or, at least, claimed to aim—at small businesses with TRS-80.) VisiCalc came out of nowhere and suddenly made the Apple II—the only platform it ran on for its first 12 months, because Disk II was a ridiculously better floppy system than any other home computer—a business machine. While corporate IT buyers never made bulk purchases, and Apple never built up a corporate sales force, the II appeared on a lot of desks as people saw what VisiCalc could do and rushed out to buy it with their own money or departmental funds. Apple's intention with the Apple III in 1980 was to offer the successor to the II that would fix all of its faults regarding the business market, such as lack of native 80-column displays, lowercase, numeric keypad, more RAM, and larger storage. The III was a bust, though, and people kept buying the II. The PC in 1981 destroyed the already anemic III sales, and completely ended corporate II sales. >I haven't any direct evidence, but I managed a medium sized corporate network of Macintosh computers in early 1990s. Their attempts at telling a coherent story for business systems was a bit of reality distortion field, Sculley-style. Ironically, their network server play was a partnership with IBM, rebadged RS/6000 crates. Completely different world. By that time Apple had long since given up directly competing with PCs and clones in the mainstream corporate market, and focused on the areas it remained strong in: Graphic design, publishing, and other "creative" markets. The Apple-branded network servers were one of the brief times it tried to widen enterprise sales; Xserve is another example. >So hmm, maybe sufficiently counter factual to play in this alternate reality -- but I think it would be more likely in business systems to see network of workstations from Sun or Apollo take some wins. Yes, that's something I could have mentioned in my list of alternate paths. Not Sun or Apollo workstations on every desk—far too expensive—but after 1985 or so X Window or NeWS boxes on every desk is viable, and then perhaps something like Sun Ray. We could have had in 1995 everyone being able to walk up to any terminal at work, put in a smart card, and have their current desktop appear.